Time Again
by IronAmerica
Summary: An unexpected event at Owl Island provides an unusual opportunity for ARK and the Cape. After all, if you had a chance to rewrite someone's past...wouldn't you do it?
1. Down the Rabbit Hole

Alright, so I finally wrote something after ending Unexpected Consequences. Proof positive that my life isn't over. Yay.

This is a response to one of the poll choices on my profile. It's still open if anyone would like to place a vote or two, for a chance to get a story of their choice up on the archive.

Un-beta'ed, as always.

Chapter One: Down the Rabbit Hole

- o -

As prison hellholes and cages went, solitary confinement in Owl Island Penitentiary was actually fairly decent, Scales thought. Of course, it wouldn't save you from boredom. The deformed smuggler was sitting on the bunk—devoid of any sheets, in case he got the urge to hang himself—staring at the pea-green wall. He was fairly sure that the color was designed to drive people absolutely starkers. The smuggler sighed, thinking about the years of incarceration and boredom he was going to endure, or at least until his public defender could get him out.

If he got to terribly bored, though, he could always try painting the wall red with his own blood or something…

Scales sighed and resisted the urge to beat his head against the wall in frustration. He'd had some fairly length incarcerations before—he quickly quashed the threatened upsurge of childhood memories—but none as dull as this. Effing hell, he was going to lose his mind before long! At this point, Scales was sure he'd very nearly kiss Fleming if that smug bastard came in to talk with him. He was bored out of his skull, and there was no other way to describe it.

Too much longer staring at the wall, and he'd see how red he could make it before that nonce of a guard called the psychiatrists. Wouldn't take much to make them think he'd cracked, actually…

The smuggler sighed and leaned back against the wall, eyes closed. There wasn't much to do in solitary besides sleep or do push-ups, and his arms hurt from the nearly six-hundred reps he'd already done. He supposed he could always ask to do his one hour outside for the so-called "exercise period", but that was nothing to write home about either. Besides that, it was the middle of the night. And he had no one to write to, or who'd accept a letter from him at this point anyways…

He could always bother his public defender in the morning, Scales supposed. He was fairly sure the lawyer was that Faraday bird—the one he'd supposedly set his boys on a few days back. No conclusive proof though; Faraday was a relatively common name in Palm City (thanks to the original clan, which reportedly had twelve male children). The public defender's office was also swamped with enough paperwork to keep the whole city busy for the next millennia. Or until ARK Corporation died.

Scales was about to doze off at that point for sheer lack of stimulation when there was a noise like a gunshot or a firecracker. (He steadfastly refused to think of the third option.) The deformed smuggler jerked upright, suddenly awake and on the alert. Either someone had started a midnight riot, or the guard was so bored that he'd decided target practice was a better way to pass his shift than…well…dating the lovely Rosie. (The guard on the shift before this nipper had disappeared for nearly half an hour; Scales didn't have to guess what he'd actually been doing.)

Scales stood up and strode over to the door, rearing the horrible orange jumpsuit so it settled better around his large frame. The guard—Desoto, or something like that (he was Hispanic, and that was about the extent of Scales' knowledge), looked just as confused as Scales felt. Wasn't quite as good as hiding it, though…

"Wot's the bleedin' point, son?" Scales rumbled, leaning casually against one of the cell's barred walls. (Thus, his cage analogy. The smuggler wasn't sure who'd designed this particular cage, but he was going to pay the man a visit. With a sledge hammer.) "Are you tryin' t' frighten us decent souls, wot want t' get a bit o' sleep?"

He yawned, as if to prove a point. The guard flinched back, no doubt scared by the sight of Scales' teeth. (According to one rumor the smuggler had heard, he could—among other "snake-like" attributes—unhinge his jaw to bite people's heads off. Literally.)

"I…I don't…" Desoto stuttered, holding his rifle closer to his chest. He looked terrified, although it would be a rare sort who'd blame him. Being in such close quarters with a certified nutter, Scales decided as he waited for a coherent response, would make many people uncomfortable. He half-wondered what the Lich's guards did after they got off shift. They probably drank all the alcohol in the battle cruiser, no doubt.

There were three more gunshot-like cracks in rapid succession, followed by an explosion that rocked the wing. Scales gave a yell of surprise as he was knocked off his feet and into the rather solid cot.

Desoto fell to the ground, stunned. He reached blindly for his radio and began depressing the red call button as fast as he could. Why wasn't anyone coming? Hadn't they heard the explosion? He pressed the call button again, wishing someone would respond.

Three clicks was supposed to bring someone…wasn't it? Damn it, where the hell was his back-up? He was too young to do this alone, for crying out loud! Desoto whimpered and shielded his eyes as a blinding white light filled the corridor. He wasn't too sure about the origin, but it seemed to emanate from the smuggler's cell.

He was going to have one hell of a migraine in the morning, Desoto thought as he lost consciousness.

Desoto sat up with a groan. His head hurt, and it felt like someone had used it as a sledgehammer, or a corkscrew. Ignoring regulations—they were new anyways, and no one was following them anyways—the young man undid the straps holding his helmet on and pulled it off. He groaned and put his head between his knees, wondering just what the hell had happened. The last thing he remembered, there'd been some sort of explosion, and… If the smuggler had broken out while he was on shift, he could kiss that scholarship to Palm City Uni goodbye.

The young guard gave a little whimper at the thought and pulled his helmet back on. No need for one of the supers to think he was disobeying dumb regulations. Mr. Portman was probably going to chew him out anyways, when he came by for the inspection tour in the morning. Maybe his cousin at ARK could get him a job when he got fired…

Desoto hauled himself upright, using the wall as support. A quick look into the cell told him that Scales was…

"Fuck it all!" Desoto yelled, not bothering to keep his voice down. The door was half-hanging on its hinges, and Scales—that weirdo—wasn't in his cell. Nope, not at all. No green smuggler. Goodbye, university.

For some reason, though, the sight of a little kid in the cell didn't bother him as much as it should have. Desoto stared at the boy, who looked terrified, for a few seconds. He then began laughing hysterically, and slid down the wall. There was _no __**way**_ this was happening to him, seriously.

- o -

Portman paced around the office, doing his level best not to start swearing out loud. There was no way this could _possibly_ be happening, and yet… He bit back another curse as his gaze fell on the boy slumped over on the sofa. The proof of the bizarre early morning events was practically staring him in the face, staring at the carpet.

Two hours ago, he'd gotten a frantic call from the warden of Owl Island. Apparently, there'd been some sort of break-out… At least, that was what the warden _thought_ had happened. Considering the circumstances, and the nature of the boy sitting in front of him, Portman didn't know how else to classify it.

Why, in the name of all things holy, would a criminal break out of solitary confinement, vanish off the island without being spotted by the guards…and then leave a small boy in the cell? (A small boy, Portman thought with a grimace, that was most likely his own _son_.) For that matter, Portman thought as he sat down, how had the kid gotten into the holding cells in the first place? At midnight, for crying out loud! If Portman didn't know any better, he'd have guessed that ARK was setting him up for a fall.

He sighed, rubbing his face with both hands. It was far too early for him to be dealing with anything more than a cup of coffee… The kid wasn't helping that feeling either. It wasn't little Dominic's fault, Portman supposed, but what else could he say?

The guards had stormed up to the isolation wing the second Desoto began calling for help. They'd found the guard in hysterics. He'd been sedated as soon as the guards figured out that they couldn't calm him down. And then they'd found a much younger carbon-copy of Scales sitting in the cell.

The kid hadn't responded until one of the guards tried to pick him up. That guard was currently in the infirmary getting stitches for the five six-inch long gashes on the side of his face. Apparently Scales had taught his son—if Dominic was his son, and not… Portman ignored the other possibility that had been brought up—how to fight. He'd fought back against all of the guards after that. What had disturbed the guards wasn't the kid's appearance, but the absolute loathing on his face. It was almost like…he wanted to watch everyone suffer, more than he was.

Portman sighed again and muttered an epithet under his breath. It was no doubt something uncharitable directed towards Peter Fleming and ARK Corporation. If not for them, Portman suspected that Scales wouldn't even have been in Owl Island awaiting trial for first-degree murder.

Now, ARK was sticking its corporate nose where it wasn't wanted. Again. Somehow, despite the lockdown the warden had put in place, someone had let the situation slip to a relative working for ARK's security teams. Peter Fleming had apparently taken an interest in the situation, and was sending a convoy down to Owl Island to take custody of Scales' son.

Which was why, in response, Portman had sent an e-mail to Orwell Is Watching. Hopefully the blogger would contact the Cape and pass the message along. He might not approve of vigilantism, or even like Scales (he despised the smuggler, actually), but the Cape was still a better option than trusting anything to ARK.

Portman looked out the window at the back of the office, and sighed. The entire island was awash in light, and, if he listened hard enough, he could hear the guard dogs somewhere in the distance. The civilians were going to be unhappy in the morning, for more reasons than one.

What the hell had Scales been thinking, Portman wondered. Why escape, only to leave his absolutely terrified son behind? He picked at a loose thread on his shirtsleeve, and wished he wasn't so adamant about staying on the wagon. If he weren't, he'd be drunk right now. (The deformed smuggler apparently had a semi-supernatural ability to drive his guards to drink. It seemed he'd passed the talent on to his son.)

He glanced over at Scales' son again, and heaved another world-weary sigh. After the sedative had taken effect, the doctors had done a routine medical check. The kid was at least twenty pounds underweight, and suffering from broken bones. Whatever else happened, Portman was going to make sure that Scales never got within thirty feet of this boy again. Abusive probably didn't even begin to cover what little Dominic had gone through.

Whatever the boy's actual parentage was, it was a safe assumption that his father had not been… Well, the best of parents, to put it lightly. Who would do that to a child? Make them so broken that…

Portman had worked in Child and Family Services in his younger days, before going to a safe alternative in politics. He couldn't handle seeing the kids he'd worked so hard to help go straight back to the people who'd damaged them in the first place. The system was broken, he knew that. But if he could only do one thing with his life, it'd be keeping that particular defect from affecting this one. He'd seen some of the scars on the kid's back as he'd been led by one of the guards into the office.

He stood up and stretched, before checking his watch again. He'd ordered the staff of Owl Island to stall ARK's convoy as long as possible, and it'd been three hours. God knew how long that tactic would work. Hopefully long enough for the Cape to reach this office, he thought.

Portman walked over to the sofa and sat down next to Dominic. At this range, it was easy to see why the guards had jokingly dubbed him "Bite-sized". He really was a carbon-copy of Dominic Raoul up close. (_Was the kid a junior, or something?_ Portman wondered absently.) With the exception of not having both ears pierced yet, Dominic Junior was the spitting image of his dad.

Dominic looked over, eyes narrowing almost imperceptibly. Portman smiled back, and held out one hand.

"Hello son," he said in a tone that gave away none of his anxiety. "My name's—"

"Mr. Portman," Dominic interrupted quietly, before looking nervously at his hands. "I heard the cozzers talkin'," he muttered quietly. "I wasn' eavesdropping, I swear! Straight up!"

Portman had to frown at the earnestness in Dominic Junior's tone. It was almost like… But no. He shoved the thought aside, trying to view this objectively. Don't blame everything on abuse; there _could_ be a simpler explanation.

"It's alright, son," Portman replied gently, shaking off the line of thought the child's protests had brought. "How are you feeling?"

Dominic shrugged, before returning his attention to his staring contest with the ugly beige carpet. "Peak," he muttered sullenly to the floor. Portman sighed; he hadn't expected much of an answer anyways, but… He caught Dominic Junior looking at him with an expression of open curiosity. As soon as the thought registered, the expression was gone as though it had never been there.

How the heck did a ten-year-old get that good at concealing his emotions? When Portman got his hands on Scales, the smuggler was a dead man…

Portman didn't try the standard line of conversation again. Small talk wouldn't do much more than make the already-sedated kid fall asleep at this point. He sighed and looked over at the miniature Scales again. "Hey kiddo," he said, reaching out to touch Dominic's shoulder. It had been an innocent gesture to make sure his young charge was still awake, but the boy reacted like he'd been attacked—and proved that the sedative had worn off.

Dominic whacked his hand away and vaulted over the arm of the sofa. Portman stared at the recently vacated seat; he was pretty sure his jaw had dropped in shock. All he'd done was try to… Portman sighed as realization hit. Had the scarring he'd seen, so very briefly, come from a belt by any chance?

Portman stood up from his seat on the sofa, and walked over to the edge that Dominic had disappeared over. The boy was crouched against the wall, shaking. His eyes were wide in fear, and he was trembling like a leaf in a windstorm. The secretary of prisons knelt down, holding his hands out.

In as gentle a tone as he could manage, Portman began speaking again. "Hey, come here kiddo. I'm sorry for scaring you," he continued, watching as Dominic Junior visibly calmed. "It's alright, come on…" Little by little, he managed to coax the boy out of the corner.

Portman smiled encouragingly as the miniature came to a stop at the very edge of the sofa. When he'd been younger, he would have killed for kids who calmed down that easily… Now, hopefully, he could ask some questions to get concrete answers. Preferably one that answered how and why he'd gotten into isolation in the middle of the night.

"Are…" Dominic started, but the question died on his lips. He trailed off and rubbed his left arm in what could have been a nervous habit, before stopping as soon as he realized that Portman was staring at him. "Nothin'," he mumbled to the sofa. "Where…" He looked around, as though visibly fishing for a new question. He hit on one, and finally asked "Where am I?"

Portman smiled, sitting back on his heels. That was one question he could at least answer. "You're on Owl Island," he said, carefully enunciating the location. He caught a fleeting look of annoyance, and grinned. The grin disappeared as he watched Dominic Junior flinch back a little. Damn. There went that little bit of rapport with him…

How much longer was it going to take Orwell to reach the Cape? There was only so long he could keep stalling ARK—and they were already on the causeway! Eventually, the phone line would have to reopen, the checkpoints on the causeway would have to be opened up, and the convoy would reach the prison. And…little Dominic would be taken by ARK, so that the company could do God only knew what.

Using hostages wasn't exactly against ARK's policy. After Fleming had attempted to buy the ports, he'd done some research. In previous deals, children of the hold-outs had gone missing. Some had been returned when the deal was concluded, some…

Well, Scales' long, rather unpleasant history with ARK Corporation wasn't going to be favorable for his son. Not in any sense of the word.

Portman looked up as Dominic Junior cleared his throat. The child was looking up at him, eyes wide in apprehension. Oh. The kid must have asked another question while he was lost in thought.

"Yes?" he asked.

Dominic swallowed, and repeated his question. "Wot's bein' done about…well…" He trailed off and waved a hand at himself. It was a general question, but Portman got the gist of it.

"We're trying to find him," Portman replied gently. "Do you remember how you got here?"

Dominic Junior shrugged. "I was…in th' cage…" he muttered, trailing off. A look of dawning horror crossed his face, and he clapped both hands over his mouth. His eyes were wide in fear, and his pupils had shrunk to tiny pinpricks.

Portman's mental estimation of Scales dropped like a rock. If that…_thing_ was this boy's father, there was a shallow, unmarked grave in the smuggler's future. A cage? Please, for the love of God, let him be referring to the isolation wing, Portman thought.

"Okay," Portman said encouragingly. "Where was this cage, kiddo?" He resisted the urge to cross his fingers as Dominic drew breath to reply.

Two events happened in quick succession, cutting off Dominic's reply. The first was the warden bursting into the office, demanding to know what was going on. Apparently, the guards had found a certain masked individual skulking around on the roof. They'd sincerely hoped he was here to find Scales, and were all soundly disappointed when they'd heard the vigilante was only investigating a tip-off related to the smuggler's alleged son.

Oh, and the ARK Convoy had reached the main gates.

The second event coincided with the warden slamming his way into the office, bellowing about the Cape. An absolutely gut-wrenching, high-pitched wail of fear tore its way out of little Dominic's mouth. Portman and the warden both stared in shock at the smuggler's miniature carbon copy in surprise.

Portman was about to try and calm the kid down again when another guard came in with a second bit of bad news. Mick Reese was with the convoy.

"Ah hell," Portman swore, completely forgetting the impressionable young child sitting two feet away from him. Mick Reese had supposedly been convicted of embezzlement when the extortion video came out. Apparently the charges had been dropped when Voyt had died; Reese's animosity towards Scales hadn't suffered the same fate.

What the hell else was going to go wrong today?

- o - o -

Hey look, it's a new story! And we've got a miniature of Scales, some bad plot twists, and a few contrived coincidences to start off the new round of writing.

So, what did you think? Good, bad, or just plain confusing? Drop a line and let me know!


	2. Changes in Perspective

Hey, it's chapter two! Things take a different turn, and Fleming is a git.

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter two: Changes in Perspective

No matter what anyone else thought, a kid who sat perfectly still and didn't say a word was fucking _creepy_. Philips gave a little mental shiver as he caught sight of Scales' son again. There was something fundamentally _wrong_ about the kid, and it wasn't being a carbon copy of Dominic freakin' Raoul. Maybe it was the fact that most ten-year-olds would have been bouncing off the walls from boredom at this point that was bothering him. Or it could have been the fact that he hadn't had any coffee since being called into work at two that morning. Whatever the cause, Philips wanted nothing more than to get as far away as possible.

At least, he thought with a mental snicker, he wasn't Mick Reese. Somehow, the poor guy had been the one elected to look after the brat. Said child had taken one look and latched onto the disgraced security captain, despite all attempts to the contrary to pry him away. (Who knew? Philips thought with a shrug. Maybe Scales' son thought Reese was a better option than his daddy. Which was, needless to say, really fucking disturbing in more ways than one.)

Philips groaned and resisted the urge to beat his head against the wall behind him. Two hours in an armored truck, with no air conditioning, and guarding a smuggler's brat was enough to drive anyone insane. He'd do a crossword puzzle or something, except he'd forgotten to bring a pen with him. And a paper, for that matter. Even if he was a high-ranking member of ARK Corporation, the _Palm City Herald_'s distribution chief wasn't going to give him his morning paper before six a.m. (There was simply _no_ justice in that.)

The security guard caught the eye of Dominic Junior again and resisted the urge to scowl. When they'd come into the warden's office at Owl Island, the secretary of prisons (Portman, or something like that), had tried to stall them. The man claimed it was to calm Scales' son down. Reese—that dick—hadn't believed him and stormed right over to the couch. Who needed to calm down a terrified, crying little kid when brute force worked _so_ well?

If not for the fact that he liked his job, Philips was fairly sure he would have protested a bit more. When he'd signed on with ARK, he hadn't thought that terrorizing small children was included in the job description. Sure, he'd helped frame an innocent cop for his psycho of a boss, but come on! That was totally different—the guy was a cop and an ex-soldier. He could have fought back if he wanted to. A little kid, though…not so much. (Even if he _was_ the son of a notorious and somewhat psychopathic smuggler…)

And the kid was looking at him again. Philips sighed and wished his body armor would let him slouch. Armor plating looked great for photos in the ARK publicity packets, but it was a pain in the ass to wear. This was going to be a long two hours…

Philips was almost relieved when Jacobs, the new guy on his team, pulled out a worn package of playing cards. Despite the fact that Jacobs had more in common with yappy little puppies, he seemed to have a little bit of everything in his pockets. A deck of cards for playing an impromptu game of poker seemed to be one of those things the packrat carried around on a daily basis. Philips caught an unusual, somewhat unexpected, look from Dominic Junior as he began dealing the cards.

It almost looked like the kid was memorizing the cards.

- o -

Vince thought that tailing convoys could be an Olympic sport or an art form at some point. He gunned the engine on his motorcycle again, running through a red light to catch up with the convoy again. Racing through the streets at a break-neck pace, while trying to stay on your ride and not losing the convoy (or a crucial body part) was hard. At least doing it in Palm City, in the wee small hours of the morning, had fewer landmines than say, an area inhabited by the average Jihadist.

Four hours ago, Orwell had given him a rather rude awakening. (She'd somehow managed to tip him out of bed.) According to her terse message, from what Vince could gather through the haze of pre-awareness, something big had gone down at Owl Island. Portman had e-mailed her about it; Vince, on the other hand, didn't really care and wanted to go back to bed. In his opinion, it could have waited until morning... Until Orwell told him that it involved Scales and a break-out.

The vigilante had been half-way out of the lair before Orwell had asked him if he'd forgotten something. The resulting blush had lit up a good portion of the lair and the market off the old trolley station. After Vince had gotten into his costume, he'd broken every motorcycle and traffic law in the state to get to Owl Island before ARK's troops did.

As it was, he'd still been a few minutes too late. The warden had led him down from the roof, trying to explain the situation. He'd shoved the vigilante into the shadows; both men had watched in mingled disgust and horror as ARK's soldiers dragged a struggling, crying boy about Trip's age out of the warden's office.

If not for the warden, who outweighed Vince by at least a hundred pound, Vince would have attacked the soldiers. Even if the kid was Scales' son, there was no reason to scare him that badly. Or to forcibly abduct him…

The scene in the warden's office gave Vince a lesson in restraining men larger than him. From what the two former police could gather, Portman had tried to stop the ARK soldiers from taking Dominic Junior. He'd received a rifle butt to the head for his troubles. If Vince hadn't seen more head injuries during his four tours of duty, he would have been worried by the amount of blood. The warden had called medical, and then given Vince an absolutely frigid glare.

"Go get those sons a' bitches," he'd said, before sitting down on the abandoned sofa to wait for the medical team. As there was nothing else Vince could do, he'd followed the warden's orders.

Now, he was busy trailing the convoy through the outskirts of Trolley Park. The convoy wasn't moving as quickly as it could have been; given that they were in a mildly residential neighborhood, however, Vince had to grudgingly admire their restraint. ARK troops weren't exactly known for being gentle where the civilian world was concerned.

The vigilante kept one eye on the armored car he'd seen Dominic Junior get dragged into as he turned into a side alley. The last thing he needed was for ARK's crack security team to realize they were being tailed. More than one mission in Afghanistan had been blown because the terrorist convoy had figured out that the goat herder wasn't actually a goat herder…

Vince grinned as the convoy ground to a screeching halt at another red light. Despite everything that had happened, and everything they could get away with, ARK drivers had some of the strangest habits in the world. Like actually obeying traffic laws, for instance… (Back in the old days, the PCPD had had a fairly bad reputation for using their sirens to run red lights. Well, Vice had, but no one liked Vice Squad anyways.)

The sun was just starting to creep over the horizon when Vince caught up with the convoy again. They were on Sycamore Boulevard now. From there, it was practically a straight shot to ARK Towers…especially if the early morning commuters didn't interfere with anything. Vince stopped cold at the unofficial edge of the business district and began using every curse he could remember, including the Urdu ones. More ARK troops had joined the convoy. Whatever the hell Fleming wanted with Scales' son (aside from the obvious), he wasn't taking any risks with attempted hijackings.

Anyone trying to stop this particular convoy was going to be road kill.

Vince muttered a final curse under his breath and turned onto a side street that led back to Trolley Park. He'd figure out a plan later…_after_ he'd gotten some sack time and a decent pot—or three—of coffee.

- o -

Vince was aware of someone shaking him, before he awoke with a start after falling to the floor again. It took another few seconds of sleep-fogged thinking for the vigilante to realize that he'd fallen asleep at the table instead of crawling into bed like normal people. He rubbed his eyes in an attempt to wake himself up faster and contemplated "normal". What did that even mean anymore?

(Normal, he finally decided as he attempted to jumpstart his brain, was for people who didn't dress up as vigilantes from comic books. Or for people who didn't run around beating up corporate rent-a-cops on a nightly basis. Pretty much, normal no longer applied to him.)

The vigilante groaned and stood up, cracking his back. He blinked owlishly over at Orwell, who had a disapproving look on her face. Despite that, Vince had to wonder how she could be so _chipper_ and _awake_ this early in the morning. "G' mornin'," he yawned, padding over to the hot plate. He could vaguely recall making a few pots around five that morning, after stumbling in from patrol…

Vince shrugged and turned the hot plate back on. He sincerely hoped it wasn't going to take too long for the horrible, cheap coffee to re-heat. Caffeine was better when it was hot and didn't taste like tar or wet cement. Having it be identifiable as coffee was also a good thing.

"Morning," Orwell replied, leaning against the wall next to Vince. "So, what happened this morning? And what was up with the convoy?"

Vince resisted the urge to scowl at his partner. It was way, _way_ too early for anyone decent to be awake or even more than a zombie. He also wanted to know why his partner wasn't in her new apartment where she could still be sleeping; or, he supposed, hacking into ARK while she waited for her espresso to brew. He grabbed a chipped green mug from the plastic crate under the card table and began pouring coffee into it.

He took a sip of the lukewarm coffee and grimaced, spitting it back into the mug. _Foul…_ "Um…well…" Vince started hesitantly, grabbing the can of sugar out of the same crate. He fiddled with the cardboard container for a few seconds as he tried to compose a reply that wouldn't aggravate the blogger.

"Well," the vigilante finally replied, pouring an ungodly amount of sugar into his mug, "it didn't go as planned. ARK got there first, and I think you can probably prove that Fleming's got a link to kidnapping." He took another sip of his coffee and sighed. Even sugar wasn't going to help coffee that'd been burned beyond recognition.

Despite all evidence to how she should have looked, Orwell didn't look very happy. "Great," she muttered with a scowl. Upon seeing Vince's confused look, she clarified. "Scales' people got wind of it about an hour ago. Apparently they've got sources in Owl Island, and someone leaked all the details to the gang lords."

"Do I have to go out again?" Vince whined. The vigilante resisted the urge to beat his forehead against the wall, and instead settled for resting it against the cool cement. Life was supposed to get easier after the bad guys went to jail, not more annoying! There was truly _no_ justice in the world…

"Nope," Orwell replied sarcastically. "You can stay here and drink coffee while the longshoremen spark off an armed revolt. Oh, and the gang war is going to be getting a lot worse in a week or so. There's some shipment coming in from the South Pacific, and the temporary head of the union isn't releasing anything until he gets Raoul's say-so."

She smiled ruefully and brushed a strand of brunette hair out of her face. "At least he's willing to accept his boss' son's say-so on it."

Vince grinned. "Always a silver lining," he replied, spinning on the balls of his feet so he could lean against the wall as well. It was a good sign that his partner was back to her usual self, after the skittishness of the week before. She'd been acting _really_ weird that week, even more so after Marty's death…

"Fine," the vigilante grumbled into his mug of coffee, shaking off the previous train of thought. "I'll go out later. After I've had coffee."

It was a testament to how much coffee the two of them drank on a daily basis that Orwell didn't argue.

- o -

Philips sat in the monitor room, feet propped up on the desk and one eye on the bank of monitors. Despite his casual pose, the security guard was on alert for anyone who might come down to the Pit, like, say, his boss or Mr. Fleming. He sighed. Instead of being allowed to go home like everyone else, he'd been elected to stay on shift to watch the monitors. Philips groaned and checked his watch again. Damn. Another twelve hours before he could get some sack time. Well, without risking getting fired for sleeping on duty, anyways.

The bored man thumbed through the sports section of the _Palm City Herald_ and muttered a few choice curses under his breath. The Pilots—Palm City's football team—had lost, 16-0, to the Philadelphia Eagles. And they'd had such a good season, too…

He moved passed the sports and folded his paper back when he reached the crossword. Philips took another look at the security monitors, and shivered. Dominic junior—or, as he'd been shyly informed to call the brat, Nicky—was still sitting in the exact same spot, staring at the door. He hadn't moved in over an hour. In fact, he'd barely even glanced up when one of the nicer guards had brought in a sandwich half an hour ago. Canteen food wasn't much to talk about, but for Christ's sake, was the kid really not hungry after being up for nearly—he checked his watch—eight hours?

Philips pried his eyes away from the monitor and tried to focus on his crossword. Kid probably wasn't hungry, was all. He'd go and eat the sandwich in a few minutes, and be hungry again in half an hour… Or, at least, Philips hoped he would. In addition to being stuck on monitor duty, Reese had cheerfully informed him he'd also be playing nursemaid for Scales' brat.

There was truly no justice in the world if a stand-up guy like Reese couldn't get capped on his way home from work.

"Fuckin' asshole," Philips muttered under his breath as he filled in four down—Argos, ancient Greek king. The security captain (how the hell had he kept his rank?) had been positively gleeful about Philips being stuck with nurse duty. Despite the fact that Nicky was largely apathetic to shades of absolutely terrified around Philips—and seemed to adore Reese for reasons unexplained (and probably best _left_ that way)—_he_ was the one stuck doing it.

Philips checked his watch again and resisted the urge to start screaming. Less than three minutes had passed since he last checked. God, was this shift _ever_ going to end?

He grabbed his mug of coffee from its precarious perch on top of one of the monitors and took a sip. The man grimaced and spit it back into the cup; and, to add sunshine to his already great day, the coffee was stone cold sludge again. He chucked the cup into a trash bin and stood up. While he was up and getting more coffee, he could check on the brat as well. Might as well earn that paycheck…

The guard tucked his newspaper under one arm and left the security room at the end of the hallway leading into the more permanent cells under ARK towers. He glumly trudged down the hallway; whoever thought that putting the coffee makers at the other end of the corridor was going to get run over by a disgruntled guard someday. Philips grinned at the thought as he pulled his keycard out of his trouser pocket.

Philips shivered as the door opened. Why the hell were they keeping this room so cold…? Dominic junior looked up from his spot on the floor, before looking back down at the slab. Philips frowned, before pulling the chair away from the desk and straddling it. The sandwich was still on the desk, untouched.

"Hey kiddo," Philips said with a smile. Dominic looked up briefly, in partial acknowledgment, and shrugged. "How's it goin'?" Philips asked, attempting to start a dialogue. "You not like ham and cheese or something?" He pointed at the sandwich, and got another shrug in return. This kid was not the chattiest one in the world, was he…?

Philips sighed and pulled his paper out from under his arm. While he waited for an actual verbal response, he could try to finish up the crossword. He was halfway through the last column of clues when Dominic spoke up unexpectedly.

"The year is wrong."

Philips looked up, confused. "Huh?" he asked, chewing idly on the end of his pen. Five letters, Greek god…

Dominic junior pointed at Philips' paper, a small frown creasing his face. "The year," he said again, still quiet. "It's wrong." Philips looked at the date on the top right-hand corner of his paper. It read the same as always: 2011. He looked down at Dominic, confused.

"Yeah right," he replied with a snort.

"Well…" Dominic said quietly, chewing his lower lip, "the date innit wrong, but… It's 1983."

Philips stared at the boy, pen held slack in one hand. "Come again?" he asked stupidly.

"The year… It should be 1983," Dominic whispered quietly to the floor, looking nervous. "No'… No' two-thousan'-eleven…"

Philips was fairly sure the world had come to a screeching halt. He reached for his radio and opened a channel to his boss. "Uh…Sawyer? Could you get Mr. Fleming on the horn?"

_-Jacob, I swear to _God_, if this is about coffee again—_ Sawyer started, sounding exasperated, only for Philips to interrupt him.

"Seriously. Get Mr. Fleming on the line. I think we got the _actual_ Scales…"

- o -

It took remarkably little time for Fleming to get down to the holding cells. Philips barely batted an eyelash as the billionaire arrived on the elevator. Phillips personally thought the billionaire looked disgustingly awake and cheerful, given the circumstances. He yawned, and resisted the urge to crack his neck again. Pulling another eighteen-hour shift was _not_ going to help his case with his soon to be ex-girlfriend…

"Officer Philips," Sawyer said stiffly, pulling out the formal card for the boss's sake. "Care to explain why you called us down here?" He looked severe and a bit nervous; given that the rumor circulating around him was that he was in line to become the next chief of police, it wasn't all that hard to guess why.

Philips resisted the urge to look at his feet. Sawyer somehow had the uncanny ability to make people feel like naughty children. It might have had something to do with the fact that he had seven or eight kids. (Philips didn't remember how many the man actually had; just that he had a _lot_ of the little heathens.)

"Well…" he gestured at the miniature Scales, and grinned weakly. "It's, um, a bit of a long story." He grinned awkwardly, and saw Sawyer scowling at him. Hooray for more overtime! He looked down at the kid standing next to him, looking equally nervous. "Tell 'em what you told me, kiddo," Philips said. Let the brat take the heat… Better him than me, Philips thought. The kid took a deep breath and replied.

"The date on Officer Philips' paper," Dominic whispered, almost too quiet for anyone to hear. The fact that he was speaking to the floor didn't help his volume.

Fleming raised an eyebrow. "Oh?" he asked, sounding interested. Philips resisted the urge to roll his eyes. How much longer was this going to take? He _really_ needed coffee…or sack time.

"Well," Dominic continued, still in the same shy whisper that Philips decided meant the kid was nervous, "the date isn' wrong. It's the year… It should be 1983."

Philips didn't know what prompted the feeling, but an ice-cold trickle of fear traced a path down his spine as Fleming's face broke into a malicious-looking grin.

He had a very bad feeling about all of this…

- o - o -

So, what'd you think? Was it good or bad? Should it be killed with fire for unoriginal plot twists? Drop a line and let me know!


	3. Proof Positive

Hey, it's an update! Sorry this wasn't out sooner-RL interfered.

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter three: Proof Positive

By the end of their workday, the scientists on the hastily assembled team had come to one concrete conclusion regarding their subject: Dominic Raoul had been a foul little monster as a child. The idea that he'd survived to adulthood—the first time around—amazed them. Prior to his unexpected arrival from the year 1983, none of them would have guessed that Scales had been as horrific and foul-mouthed as a child as when he'd been an adult. The more sensible members of the team had left well enough alone in regards to questioning the miniaturized smuggler about his childhood.

Doctor Graham Spellman had not been one of them. He'd been the one unfortunate enough not to spot the warning signs, and had discovered that, while pint-sized, the miniature Scales was still a formidable threat. Doctor Spellman was currently sitting at one of the tables in the break room, nursing a mug of coffee and sixteen stitches in his left hand and over his right eye.

"He's a little devil-child," Graham muttered sullenly into his mug of coffee. The scientist sighed in relief as the caffeine jumpstarted his brain for the fifth time that day. He'd been on duty at the lab since four that morning, trying to get his equipment into order; it was now well into the evening, and it wasn't looking like any of the team of twelve were going home any time soon.

Finn, one of the younger scientists, grinned. "You're just sore 'cause he bit you," he replied, throwing a package of pop tarts across the room to his friend.

"Quiet, brat," Spellman muttered sullenly. Finn and his friend, Hunter—the two youngest members of the team—began laughing. Spellman muttered something under his breath that had the two hyenas howling in laughter and holding their sides. "It is _not_ a laughing matter!" Spellman roared, standing up. He winced and rubbed his cheek, hoping he hadn't pulled the stitches. The doctor also wished the anesthesia hadn't worn off quite so fast.

No one was quite sure what had set the little beast off, but one second Dominic had been perfectly calm around the large group of complete strangers. The next, he'd gone wild and had attacked anyone who'd tried to get near him. This included Reese and Philips, the only two guards Scales seemed to have taken a shine to (or at least tolerated, on some level). Reese was currently sporting a black eye and a fractured cheekbone from where Scales had head-butted him. Philips was downing painkillers like there was no tomorrow as one of the on-site doctors attempted to reset his nose and put in six stitches.

It had taken a sedative powerful enough to take down several grown men to knock Dominic out. After that, Philips, blood still gushing from his nose and the gash on his forehead, had carried the limp child back to the cell he was living in for the time being.

That had been almost six hours ago.

Finn stood up from his table in the back corner, startling Spellman out of his reverie. "I'm going to see if I can get the prelims done," the younger scientist said, gathering his paperwork up into a messy pile. "You want anything done, Graham?" he asked, brushing a strand of hair out of his eyes. Spellman shook his head and shooed his younger colleague away, before returning his attention to his paperwork spread out before him.

"Okay," Finn said lightly, before pouring two mugs of coffee out of the massive carafe on the countertop. He slung his bag of paperwork over one corner, picked up a hard-sided case, and—juggling all that and the two mugs of coffee—left the break room. He might as well see how Philips was doing, and bring the security guard some decent-tasting caffeine.

(It might have been because the nerd herds were more valuable, or the fact that most of them had secondary degrees in chemical engineering, but the science levels had the best coffee in ARK Towers. Well, among the working-class drones, anyways. Peter Fleming, by unwritten rule, had the best coffee. The geeks weren't about to disabuse him of that notion, for fear of losing their caffeine.)

When he got off the elevator, Finn saw Mick Reese on duty in the guard station, nursing a black eye and a mug of…well, black sludge was probably the most charitable description. Finn sighed and resigned himself to a caffeine-free evening. The security guard, while an ass and a jerk, didn't deserve to be condemned to drinking that foul sludge…

Finn sighed and knocked on the doorjamb to get Reese's attention. The man looked around, eyebrows raised in a question. The scientist held out the mug of coffee. "Do you want this?" he asked, praying the answer was no. He resisted the urge to smile in relief as the guard waved away the offer with his mug.

"I'm good," Reese rasped, massaging his throat. Finn shrugged.

"Suit yourself." He peered over the guard's shoulder at the security monitors. Only one of the high-security cells was actually in use at the moment; the others were either turned off or showing a combination of static and bare rooms. "Is Philips in with the little beast?" he asked, resting his forearms on the back of Reese's chair.

"Yes, and get off my seat," Reese replied, taking a sip of the foul black sludge. Finn rolled his eyes, but complied. One of the many problems the herd had with Reese stemmed from the man's psychotic need to make their lives difficult. His favorite revenge tactic was to lock members of the science teams out of their own labs, citing "safety concerns". Despite the numerous complaints made against him, Fleming had yet to do anything. It was only a matter of time before one of the scientists snapped and killed Reese—and made it look like an accident.

"Thanks Reese," Finn said, hefting the bio-hazard case back up. The bright orange crate was bulky and a hell of a lot heavier than it should have been, given its relatively small size. It was probably the packaging designed to keep the half-dozen needles and vials for collecting blood safe…

"No problem," Reese muttered, distracted by a magazine. "Little bastard breaks his nose and Philips forgives him in less than three seconds…" he muttered under his breath as Finn left.

When Finn reached the cell that Dominic Raoul was being held in, the scientist paused. Indecision was practically a paralytic some days. There was absolutely no reason he couldn't wait until tomorrow to do the preliminary stages of the blood work, or even finish his paperwork instead…

Except for the niggling little fact that Mr. Fleming wanted the basic, preliminary results to be delivered alongside his morning paper. And, Finn thought with a sullen glare as he set the bio-hazard case down, the man could get up and get his paper at five in the damn morning.

He sighed and shoved the door open with his shoulder. Philips was straddling the lone chair in the cell, intently working on another crossword. The security guard did them almost religiously, now that he thought about it… Scales was sitting in a corner, finishing off what looked like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich from the canteen. Canteen food was nasty, Finn thought as he cleared his throat. Well, there was no accounting for taste some days, and the former smuggler _was_ technically a ten-year-old again…

Philips looked up, smiling as best he could. He was sporting two swollen, black eyes, and had changed his shirt sometime in the last six hours. The old one was probably gracing the bottom of a trash can in the locker rooms in the basement now…

"Hey doc," he said thickly. The security guard returned his attention to the crossword he'd been working on and was about to start filling in another space when the doctor's arrival finally registered on a conscious level. "What's up?" he asked, closing the book of crosswords. "Need some help corralling a wild animal up in the labs again?"

Finn shook his head and held up the bio-hazard case. "I need to get some blood samples to get the prelims done before midnight," he replied, setting the case down on the table. He held out the Styrofoam mug of coffee to his colleague as a sort-of peace offering; Philips accepted it with a grateful smile.

"Boss breathing down your necks?" he asked, taking a sip of coffee.

"You have no idea," Finn muttered, popping the clasps open on the case. "Get the brat over here, would you?" he added, pulling on a pair of rubber gloves. "I actually want to go home tonight."

Philips nodded and crossed the room to where Dominic was sitting. He spoke quietly for a few minutes while Finn set his equipment up. Apparently whatever he'd said had convinced Scales to come over, and the brat complied with relatively little fuss. Philips lifted him up onto the table, and went back to his seat.

"Hey Dominic," Finn said with a smile. Scales stared back, face blank. Finn resisted the urge to shiver. Creepy little kid… "You wanna hold your arm out for me?" He held up a cotton swab that he'd soaked in iodine so the kid could see it.

Scales complied, looking disinterestedly at the doctor. Finn swabbed the crook of his elbow and held up the needle.

"I'm going to use this to draw some blood," he said in what he hoped was an appropriately soothing tone. "There's going to be a little pinch, and—"

"Don't patronize me," Scales muttered sullenly. Finn raised an eyebrow, and shrugged.

"Alright, little man. Whatever you say," Finn continued. He dropped the soothing tone and went back to his normal manner. "Like I said, there's going to be a bit of a pinch, and then everything'll be over. Okay?"

Scales scowled at him, but nodded in acquiescence. "Peak," he mumbled under his breath. Whatever else he was—insane little attack-troll not withstanding—he wasn't afraid of needles. (It was a refreshing change of pace—the last time he'd had to deal with a kid, he'd ended up downing Tylenol like most people downed candy.) The entire process took less than twenty minutes, which, when Finn checked his watch, left him with a little over four hours in which to get the most basic prelims done before he could call it a day and crash in Spellman's lab.

(The elder scientist, one of the veterans of ARK's research-and-development teams, had smuggled a cot into his lab at some point. Almost everyone in his department had used it at some point; Spellman had, to the best knowledge of everyone in the department, never used it himself.)

Finn finished packing up his equipment, said goodbye to Philips and Dominic, and left. He was practically whistling as he left. Four hours and then he could finally get some sleep!

- o -

Dominic sat on the cot, eyes closed as if he was about to fall asleep. The cool cement felt soothing against his back, which was sore again. Officer Philips had left an hour ago, and the lights had gone out shortly after that. He sighed and rubbed his head, wishing it didn't hurt so much. Considering how utterly bonkers everything had gotten in the past two days—time travel? Barking mad, that was…-it wasn't very hard to guess the reason _why_.

He'd gone to sleep in 1983 after another drunken beating, and woken up in a prison…in the year 2011. So far, the only benefit Scales had found so far was that no one in ARK had actually put any effort into finding Mr. McClintock; none of the people he'd listened to had even mentioned trying to find him. At least, they hadn't mentioned it with the intention of returning him to that tosser's custody—unlike the berk from Child and Family Services had…

(Scales' more cynical side told him that it was because Mr. Fleming—the man who owned ARK Corporation, which was a _lot_ bigger than it had been in 1983—didn't want to lose such a valuable research opportunity. As much as he hated to admit it to himself, Scales believed the snide little voice. People _never_ did anything out of the goodness of their hearts. There had to be something in it for them, or they wouldn't lift a finger. Even Daddy hadn't taken him in out of pure, unadulterated altruism; and even despite that, he'd been the nicest human to do something for him without expecting much of anything in return…)

The boy sighed again, and ran his hands over the top of his head. He grimaced at the feel of stubble, and made a mental note to ask Officer Philips about getting it shaved tomorrow… And maybe he'd see if the altruism that had gotten him half a sandwich earlier that evening would continue tomorrow morning. Nothing that good ever happened twice.

Scales lay down on the cot and curled up, shivering. The thin t-shirt and shorts he was wearing wasn't doing much against the perpetual chill of the cell. There wasn't a blanket or even sheets on the cot that he could use to stave it off. Even though the cement had felt nice earlier against the nastier cuts on his back, the room was now getting too cold to be even remotely comfortable.

He shivered again and sniffled a little, hoping the fever would blow over quickly. He didn't really know how long it normally took, but the infection and accompanying fever had probably set in by now… The cage and his living conditions—back in 1983, anyways—hadn't been very good for his health. Scales sincerely hoped that, wherever Mr. McClintock was in this year, he was having a piss-poor go of things.

Scales yawned and began coughing. After the spasms died down, he rubbed his eyes with both hands. Maybe if he focused on something other than getting sick again, he could sleep… His eyelids drooped and before he knew it, he was asleep.

- o -

_The trailer was dark again. McClintock had turned the light off sometime around nine pm, shortly after starting his latest binge session. Scales was mostly relieved that the man hadn't given him a beating—he usually got one if McClintock was in a sour mood, or if he'd been drinking for a while._

_Scales curled up in the tiny alcove formed by the space between the trailer wall and the arm of the couch. He wished he was back home with Daddy, and not with Mr. McClintock again. Dumb cozzers ruined everything…_

_He flinched when McClintock stood up from the table at the other end of the trailer. He knew that look—McClintock was pissed up and stark raving mad. The ten-year-old resisted the urge to whimper, and closed his eyes. Maybe if he imagined it long enough, he could make everything go away, and he'd be back in the brownstone on Sycamore Boulevard._

_That dream was crushed when McClintock reached into his hiding place and dragged him out. "Quit strugglin', y' li'l freak," the carnie slurred as he pulled Scales out from his hiding spot. The boy whimpered as McClintock lifted him up and flung him at the wall. _

_Dominic slid down the wall, stunned. Before he could recover, McClintock was back, holding a rope and a knife. Dominic scrambled backwards, trying to reach the relative safety of his hidey-hole._

_He wasn't fast enough._

"_You are…" McClintock slurred, swaying on his feet, "i' a lo' o' trouble, old son. C'mere, y' li'l bastard," he snarled, lunging forward to grab Dominic by his shirt-front. The cheap cotton held up well enough against the attack._

_Scales whimpered as McClintock slammed him face-first into the coffee table. The man bent over him, whispering obscenities under his breath. Scales could smell the cheap whiskey—it was strong, sour-smelling, and heavy like a funeral pall._

_He wasn't sure when he passed out, but some time must have passed. Scales peered around the cage, and sighed. If it hadn't been for the effing cozzers, he could be with Daddy right now. Daddy probably would have made him cocoa and sent him back to bed after he'd finished._

_Mr. McClintock, on the other hand, beat him unconscious. Scales sighed and curled up. He bit his lip to keep from howling in agony as his hands came in contact with a new injury. McClintock must have used the…_

_Scales traced his fingers over the cuts, frowning. They were far too precise to be from a whipping. He bit his lip and tried not to cry as he realized what McClintock had done._

Dominic shot awake, chest heaving like he'd just run a marathon. After a few seconds he calmed down and managed to wipe his eyes without putting one of them out. His hands were shaking pretty badly, but it was getting better as he became more aware of his surroundings. He wasn't in the cage, realizing that McClintock had made his opinion quite clear; he was in his room at ARK Towers. (Alright, it was a cell. It might as well have been a room in the Savoy, as far as he was concerned. Mr. McClintock and his knife were nowhere near, and he could go back to sleep if he wanted to.)

He curled up again, almost ready to start sobbing in relief. He was _safe_. As long as Mr. Fleming thought he was valuable, he was safe. Dominic nearly jumped up to the ceiling when the cell door banged open. Mick Reese, not Officer Philips (unfortunately…) was standing in the doorway. The securities man was holding two cups and a brown paper sack in one hand, and was shoving his keycard back into his trouser pocket with the other.

Mick stared back him warily, before placing the items on the table. Dominic's nose twitched as he caught the scent of sausage—it was greasy, and he kind of hated it because it made his tummy hurt, but it was hot. And hot food was something he liked (Daddy hadn't always had time to make something hot in the mornings, but when he had, it'd always been good).

"Uh…" Reese said, clearly not have been expecting Scales to be awake at all. "Morning," he finally said, a tad lamely. He pulled the chair away from the desk and sat down.

Dominic sat up, rolling onto his knees. "G' mornin'," he whispered back. The boy wanted to add that he'd had a nightmare, but didn't think Reese would really care. Despite his resemblance to Daddy, he had the feeling that that was as far as similarities went. He might get a half-hearted "sorry kiddo" if he was lucky, but that was it.

The ten-year-old was rather surprised, then, when the mattress dipped next to him. Reese was sitting next to him on the cot. Despite the nervousness in the man's posture, he did seem to _look_ concerned. _Wasn't money a wonderful motivator? _Dominic thought cynically.

"It looked like you were having a nightmare," Reese said, startling Dominic out of his thoughts. Dominic looked down at his knees and didn't answer. After a few minutes, he shrugged.

"Might 'ave been," he mumbled under his breath. He heard Reese sigh. Well, maybe the concern wasn't _entirely_ motivated by Mr. Fleming's money and interest…

Before he could stop himself, Dominic grabbed Reese in what could be termed a hug. He clung to the man and, to add insult to the injury, began sobbing. Everything was just _too_ much to deal with. He was safe from McClintock—but almost thirty years away from anyone he knew. Everything was just…_strange_.

After a few minutes of awkwardness, Dominic felt Reese returning the hug. It might have been out of discomfit or genuine feeling on the man's part, but Dominic didn't care.

Just for a few seconds, he could pretend he'd never time-traveled, and that Daddy was the one hugging him.

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Was it good? Bad? Confusing and contrived? Drop a line and let me know!


	4. Play ball

Hey, it's an update! Orwell finally takes action and moves the plot forward.

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o -

Play ball!

Orwell chewed on her lower lip as she perused the lines of code that made up the last layer of ARK's newest firewall around their servers. The techies had really tried to be trickier about their security protocols this time around—especially where one of the science levels was concerned, for some reason—but there was nothing quite like proving people wrong to make breaking their protocols apart that much more fun. (ARK's computer teams should have learned, by now, not to declare anything of theirs unhackable. A five-man team of bored gamers in Seattle had broken the firewall into tiny pieces, and then spent the rest of their weekend vandalizing the ARK Corporation home page—mostly by redirecting it to the main page for the Black Rose. Orwell didn't want to know where the thirteen-year-old ringleader had heard of that group…)

After a few tense minutes of waiting to see if the hack would still work—ARK's techies had had three days to repair the majority of the damage, after all—the blogger grinned. She gave a small cheer, quieted when she remembered that her partner was still in the room, and went back to work. She'd get a cup of coffee as a reward, later. Meanwhile…

The blogger stuck her tongue out between her teeth as she concentrated on finding anything worth publishing on Orwell Is Watching, and… Orwell froze, before clicking back through the last two processes to make sure she hadn't misread something. She stopped on the one that had caught her attention, and stared at it for a few minutes.

The blogger sighed and rubbed her temples wearily. Daddy had finally snapped, and… What the hell?

Since when did Peter Fleming have this big of an interest in time travel?

The blogger frowned and retyped the search command, just in case she'd misread the file name. The same results popped back up. Someone on the other end had evidently updated the mainframe for the project, because this time there was a list of scientists attached to the project on file. She scrolled through the list, absently taking note of their specialties. Four of them had strong backgrounds in chemical engineering, with particular emphasis in chemical warfare (no surprise there…); two had a background in genetics and physics (she'd seen stranger combinations before), and the rest were a wider mix of disciplines. (Oddly enough, there was a Child Psychologist, with a secondary emphasis in Quantum Mechanics attached to the project.)

Alright, she had to admit that the quantum mechanics and the physics geeks might have been useful to researching alleged time-travel… But why was over half the team better-versed in genetics or chemical engineering? Wouldn't it make more sense to have the majority of the team versed in physics or quantum mechanics instead?

Orwell sighed and rubbed her temples, feeling another migraine creeping up on her. She was operating on far too little sleep, and far, far too little caffeine… The blogger stood up and stalked over to the trio of coffeepots Vince kept in the lair in case of midnight patrols or an early-morning need for caffeine. The blogger resisted the urge to scream in frustration. There was no coffee, and what coffee there was in the bottom of the pot was indistinguishable from black, gritty cement. It'd be another twenty minutes before the nearest diner opened up, and that meant twenty minutes before she could even _think_ about processing anything she'd found!

She whirled around to glower at her partner, and sighed in frustration. Her usual death glower wasn't going to work on someone who was asleep. The blogger really hated to yell at the vigilante anyways, especially when he'd apparently just gotten to sleep. (Considering how crazy and out of control the last five days had been, the blogger couldn't begrudge him that.)

Vince had stumbled into the lair twenty minutes ago dripping wet and covered in sludge from the bottom of the harbor. He'd changed into shorts and a tank top, before attempting to scrape the worst of the muck off his armor. The vigilante was now slumped over the Command Center, using his breastplate as a pillow. According to what he'd told her, Kazzie—the temporary head of the Longshoremen's Union—was surprisingly agile for such a big guy. Last night, or really early this morning depending on how the situation was looked at, he'd thrown Vince into the harbor.

The dark circles under Vince's eyes were a testament as to how much sleep he'd been getting as a result of Scales' odd vanishing act last week. (Although, considering what she'd just dug up, Orwell suspected that Scales hadn't exactly vanished…) Orwell smiled softly as her partner mumbled his wife's name under his breath, a small frown creasing his brow. After a few seconds, his breathing evened out and the small smile reappeared back on his face.

The blogger smiled again, and grabbed the thick patchwork quilt off of Vince's bed. She draped it over the sleeping vigilante's shoulders and tiptoed back to her bank of computers. The blogger began typing as quietly as she could, not wanting to disturb her sleeping partner. She sighed and concentrated on researching all of the scientists connected with Daddy's strange project. Well, the ones who stuck out like a sore thumb, anyways.

The blogger could understand someone on the project having a small bit of training in basic psychology. There was nothing else to do at university when Daddy had pushed her into attending all those years ago… So, why was a pediatrician attached to the project now? Was Scales' son connected with the crazy project, or…

The blogger's fingers froze over the keyboard before she could type in another command, and she paused at that thought. Why was Fleming researching time travel, and putting a pediatrician on the project? What did he suspect? Orwell frowned and propped her chin up with one hand as she contemplated the possible scenarios.

After a few seconds, the blogger scowled at her keyboard and began typing again. There had to be a logical answer to this dilemma, and she was going to find it… There had to be a connection between a pediatrician, Scales' son, and the illogical prospect of "time travel". (That, or Daddy had _really_ jumped into the deep end, Orwell thought with a pained grimace.)

Orwell sighed, popped a few Tylenol into her mouth, and swallowed them dry before returning her attention to her computer. She had a job to do, and that involved rifling through all of the files on her computer.

Why on earth was there a report stating that Scales' son wasn't his son…and was actually his younger self…?

- - o - -

By noon, everyone involved with the time-travel project had come to one concrete conclusion: the pediatrician that had been brought in to look after the brat's health was a bigger menace than the brat in question. Spellman had found her, and had then convinced Mr. Fleming that it was absolutely necessary to bring her onto the project. He'd mentioned something about ethics, and possible outside investigations if a certain blogger got involved (everyone knew that Orwell was the one who'd redirected the company's webpage over the weekend). Shortly thereafter, Doctor Grace Putnam had joined their little team.

To hammer the point home beautifully, even Mick Reese thought Doctor Putnam was a bitch. That was what had gotten everyone's attention in the first place—Reese was well-known for his absolute hatred of Scales, pint-sized or not. (Even the _lovely_ video making its rounds of the building hadn't changed his opinion. Mick Reese refused to admit that he'd given the miniature Scales a hug.) One would have thought that the security captain would have been Doctor Putnam's best friend, given that it was pretty much his stated mission to make sure that the child-sized Scales was miserable.

The scientists had also noticed something else: Poor Officer Philips had taken to hiding in their offices, and was getting rather creative with his excuses around Putnam. Given that the pediatrician, who was almost thirty years his senior, was trying to flirt with him every time he got near her, no one could exactly blame her. The poor guy was currently hiding under one of the tables in the office that Finn and Hunter shared. The two scientists were getting rather close to throwing him out, as he'd started bemoaning the fact that he'd forgotten his book of crosswords in Putnam's office a floor up.

Hunter had remarkably little sympathy for the security officer hiding under his desk. The scientist peered under his desk for the third time that morning and sighed in exasperation. Philips had fallen asleep and was snoring lightly. He resisted the urge to kick the guard in the ribs and turned his attention back to the results of the preliminary blood work on his monitor.

He rubbed his eyes wearily before shoving his thick-rimmed glasses back up the bridge of his nose. There had to be some genetic explanation for what the hell had happened to the smuggler… Fleming wanted answers, and it was quite apparent that the billionaire wanted them yesterday. Hunter couldn't exactly blame him for that—having access to a literal "fountain of youth" would actually be pretty cool…

The scientist groaned under his breath and resisted the urge to beat his forehead against the desk as the incoming call button on his intercom lit up. He accepted the call and propped his chin up on one hand as the call played out.

-_Danny, get Philips off his ass and send him to Putnam's office. The brat's gone mental again._-

Hunter sighed and muttered a vague affirmative. He looked under his desk again and grinned. This was gonna be fun…

The startled yelp from the security officer could be heard at the other end of the corridor.

- o -

As soon as Captain Reese and his men had left the cell, Dominic curled up on the cot and hugged his knees, doing his best not to start crying. He'd really bollocksed this up, hadn't he…? Back in Doctor Putnam's office, he hadn't done what she'd told him. And then, he'd been really, really bad when she'd tried to make him comply. Mr. Reese had come in after he'd started screaming at Doctor Putnam to leave him alone. She'd slapped him really hard, and had then made it seem like he'd done something wrong first.

Mr. Reese had accidentally thrown him into the wall as he tried to get Doctor Putnam out of the exam room. Shortly thereafter, Officer Philips had arrived with a few more guards to help Mr. Reese. Dominic, who'd been hiding behind the exam table, practically wilted at the disappointed look on Officer Philips' face. It was like when Daddy had given him that sad, disappointed-in-you look after he'd forgotten his book at the park… That look made Dominic's chest hurt really bad when he knew someone was disappointed with him.

Dominic curled up into a tighter ball and squeezed his eyes shut, wishing the whole world would just go away. His back really hurt from where he'd slammed into the wall, and the newer cuts were getting achy because they'd opened up again. Some of them were starting to really, really sting, and… The young Scales bit his lip and whimpered low in his throat as the door to the cell opened.

The mattress dipped next to him, and then whoever had sat down placed their hand on his shoulder…right over the cut that had reopened. Dominic bit his lip to keep from crying out in pain—who wanted to help a freak, especially one who'd been bad? He peeked up to see who was visiting him, and whimpered again. Officer Philips was looking down at him with a look of almost paternal concern on his face, completely at odds with how he'd looked an hour or so before.

"Hey kiddo," Philips said gently, shaking Dominic's shoulder. "You still awake there?"

Dominic nodded and uncurled from his tight ball. "Hullo Officer Philips," he replied quietly, keeping his gaze focused on his knees. Before he could apologize, Philips began speaking again.

"You know you're in a lot of trouble right now?" Philips asked, although Dominic was pretty sure it was a rhetorical question. The guard was still using the same quiet tone of voice that the tiger lady at the circus used. Isabelle had used it when she wanted to calm down one of her pets, mostly after some dumb todger threw something at the tiger cubs.

"Yeah," Dominic nodded, and rubbed at his eyes. Stupid tears. You're a pathetic tosser, brat. Philips smiled back at him, and rubbed his shoulder in what could have been a comforting gesture, if not for the cuts on his back. Dominic flinched away from the guard's hand, unable to keep from issuing a low whimper of distress.

Philips raised an eyebrow curiously, but took his hand away. The guard frowned at Dominic's back and then at his hand; he rubbed at it with the fingers of his other hand, before sighing. He looked confused about something...

"Dominic…" Philips started curiously, as though he were about to ask a question. He stopped and sighed again, rubbing his hand on his trousers. "Kiddo, you know that attacking Doctor Putnam got you in a lot of trouble?"

Dominic nodded, scowling. "She star'ed it," he muttered sullenly under his breath. Philips snorted in disbelief.

"That's not the point, dumbass." Philips muttered another curse under his breath and rubbed his face with both hands. "That's _not_ the point, kid. Unless you start cooperating, you're going to be sedated every time you leave the cell, and I'm going to get some serious mileage out of my handcuffs."

Dominic rolled his eyes at the mention of handcuffs. "I c'n dislocate me thumbs," he muttered under his breath. Philips groaned in disbelief.

"And you've lost track of everything I've said," Philips muttered. "The point," the security officer continued, "is that no one here likes you or even remotely trusts you. If you don't stop attacking people, they're going to start hurting you back. Mr. Fleming… Well, I doubt he'd care as long as he got what he wanted."

Dominic looked down at the ugly blue-and-grey striped mattress he was sitting on. He scowled as everything Philips had told him sunk in. He was only safe as long as he was valuable, and "safe" only meant they weren't going to beat him to death. Why couldn't they finally just tell him that he'd gone too far? That's what Daddy had done, after he'd gotten fed up with him running around and hiding in the basement all the time.

"So…I should jus' stop tryin' t' protect meself?" Dominic asked quietly, picking at a loose thread on his shorts. He whimpered again as Philips placed his hand right over one of the cuts on his shoulders.

"As long as you don't injure anyone," Philips replied with a slight grin. He pointed at his nose, and added in a joking tone, "And as long as you don't ruin my good looks again. Or else." The security officer sighed in annoyance as his young charge flinched at the joke, weak as it was.

Dominic twitched when Philips' radio squawked to life. The security officer stood up and walked to the other end of the room and listened to the person on the other end for a few seconds, face getting redder and angrier the more he listened.

After a few seconds, Philips shoved his radio back into its clip on his belt. "You," he said, pointing to Dominic, "Stay put. I have to go plead for my life in front of the boss…" The distracted-looking security officer left the cell.

As soon as Officer Philips had left the room, Dominic sat up. When he was certain no one was coming back, he slowly peeled his t-shirt off, gasping in pain as it disconnected from some of the cuts on his back. The boy looked over his shoulder at his back and bit his lip nervously. At least three of the cuts from the whip were infected, two of them were bleeding sluggishly (how come none of the guards had noticed that…?), and the word Mr. McClintock had carved into his back looked really gross and kind of wet. He looked up at the camera and prayed that someone who cared was watching the monitors.

Dominic coughed, and lay down on his side. As he drifted off to sleep, his last thought was that Officer Philips was probably going to come back soon. Maybe he'd find a dead body…

- o -

Philips was rather grateful that Mr. Fleming was speaking to the members of the time travel team in smaller sections or individually. Apparently Orwell had broken through ARK's firewalls again, and had decided to steal information instead of committing acts of petty (albeit kind of funny) vandalism. (Who knew that Orwell liked scary porn?) Unfortunately for everyone involved in the project, Orwell had found a lot more than something worth vandalizing. He'd turned several hundred man-hours into a brand new shiny blog post.

The only thing that had saved the entire team—and the techies—was that the news hadn't hit the local or national news channels yet. It was hardly surprising that Mr. Fleming was in a right mood, though. There were more hits per minute on the new post than there had been per hour on the extortion video. The comments supplied by Orwell's oh-so-helpful following hadn't been…pleasant, to say the least.

Philips, on the other hand, was going to find Jacobs after the meeting was over. And then he was going to beat the yappy little puppy to a bloody pulp. Jacobs' reports had one of the starring roles in the post, mostly involving his comments regarding the br…the kid's treatment. Jacobs needed to learn how to watch his mouth, and what he wrote. Speaking of which…

The security guard tapped Finn on the shoulder to get the scientist's attention. Something was bothering him… The geek looked up from the file he was perusing, a questioning look on his face. Philips took a breath, and began speaking quietly so that no one else could hear him. "I got called in from the pit," he began.

"Where they're keeping the attack troll," Finn murmured in reply, flipping to another page in his folder. "What about it?" He sounded bored.

"Have…have you noticed anything, well…" Philips paused, unsure of how to phrase his question. "Well, have you noticed anything _odd_, around the kid? Like…" He paused again, wondering how he could describe the odd smell or the wet-feeling shirt that the brat was wearing. "Like something smells like it's rotting?" he finished lamely, waving his hands in a non-committal sort of way.

"I work with chemicals all day," Finn reminded the security guard. He closed his folder with a sigh, and leaned back in his chair. "But…I suppose…No, that wouldn't be right…" Finn trailed off, tapping the manila folder against his chin, looking lost in thought.

"What?" Philips hissed impatiently. "In case it slipped your mind, nerd-boy, that kid is the only reason any of us are still employed and not filling out our resumes!" He looked around, praying that no one had heard his little outburst. Thankfully, none of them had. Sexton was perusing a magazine, or at least appeared to be, because his eyes kept darting towards the door that led to Fleming's office and the boardroom. Everyone else who was getting raked over the coals was trying their best to look busy.

"Well," Finn muttered, shoving his folder back into the black messenger between his feet, "I did think it was kind of odd… Did you smell something…like, something that smelled…kind of gross? Like it was trying to decide whether it was rotting or turning into a fish?"

Philips grinned at the analogy, and stifled some laughter behind one hand. After a few seconds, he sobered up and nodded. "Kind of. Like…like the time I cut my leg open hiking, and it started to fester." He shuddered, remembering the doctors making bad jokes about having to amputate his leg if the pus didn't drain out quickly enough.

"Yeah…" Finn muttered, another faraway look in his eyes. Philips sighed and slouched back in his chair. The scientist was going to be away for awhile while he thought. And now he had no one to talk to…

Philips was drawn out of his thoughts by Sawyer coming out of Fleming's office. The normally cheerful-looking man now looked unusually grim. Philips swallowed nervously, and saw Sexton do the same. Who was getting the ax, then? He silently prayed that it was going to be the puppy who got axed in this round…

"Show of hands, who's got experience with moving house and covering things up?" It seemed that, according to the annoyed look on his boss's face, that it wasn't a rhetorical question. After a few seconds, Philips raised his hand awkwardly.

"I…had to move a lot," he volunteered, before lowering his hand so he could rub the back of his neck. Damnit, what the hell had he just volunteered for? Kia was going to kill him and eat him for breakfast if he worked any more overtime this month! Hell, she'd already mentioned going out with _her_ boss more than a few times!

"Good," Sawyer said, smiling again. "You're in charge of the new project. We've got forty-eight hours before the press starts breathing down our necks. And by our, I mean yours." Philips sighed as his boss continued speaking. "We need to reopen one of the old labs a few levels down and make it look like someone's been using it for at least a month."

"Uh…" Finn was the one who'd spoken this time. Sawyer made an impatient gesture, and the scientist continued. "Well, which one? There's only the lab from about eleven years ago, where that…little kid. Oh." Recognition dawned on Finn's face, and he grinned. "I've always wanted to use that one," he muttered to Philips, who looked confused. "The computers were state of the art back in 2000. I can probably make a fortune on the antiques down there…"

Philips was about to respond to Sawyer's next question when another guard rushed into the anteroom, looking pale and panicky. Oh, this couldn't be good Philips thought with a grimace. He was right.

"The brat collapsed, and he's gone into shock."

All hell broke loose in the anteroom.

- o - o -

So, what did y'all think? Good? Bad? Anyone worried about Philips' future with ARK yet?


	5. Coup of the Century

A three-pronged attack this time, with very little input from kid Scales.

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter five: Coup of the Century

If anyone had picked incensed as a verb to describe Peter Fleming, they would have been making a severe understatement. The billionaire was mulling over a new problem, related to his current pet project. Less than twelve hours ago, the so-named "time travel" project had been exposed on the internet. The blogging menace Orwell and his insipid blog, Orwell Is Watching, had turned his company into a virtual laughingstock almost overnight. So, to put it lightly, incensed wasn't a good word to describe the billionaire's mood.

Infuriated would have been closer to the mark.

Weak morning sunlight filtered through the massive tinted windows of the billionaire's office, illuminating everything it touched with grayish-blue light. Fleming was pacing around his office like a caged tiger, lost in thought. For the first time in his _life_, Fleming wished that Chess still had a presence somewhere in the back of his mind. Despite the fact that his homicidal alter-ego could be extremely annoying and violent—an unfortunate side-effect surrounding the circumstances of his creation—at times, Chess did have a way with words. (He was a bit of a snake in the grass, when he wasn't feeling the need to massacre everyone.) He'd always been willing to help Fleming hash out his plans, and had even had suggestions that _didn't_ involve using heavy weaponry on the opposition…occasionally.

Fleming sighed in exasperation and sat down at his desk. He had more things to worry about then a homicidal maniac that had formerly been a resident in the back of his skull. Less than three weeks ago, his only concern had been Orwell, and whether or not the blogging menace would find out about the millions he poured into the search for his missing daughter. He put his hands on the desk and paused, lost in thought again. The glass top was warm under his hands, as was the keyboard. Something had to be done about Orwell, and about the child-sized version of his former enemy. The expose about his…activities…on the docks had been disastrous for the most part. Although, he had to admit to himself, it hadn't turned out to be a _complete_ loss… (Having a legitimate excuse to devote resources to hunting that idiot who thought he was a superhero was always a benefit. Fleming resisted the urge to smirk.)

Now, as a result of Orwell, his new project had been dragged into the light. Due to the blogger's increased popularity, the public was baying for his blood again. There was no convenient scapegoat he could use this time. (Not one that he was willing to sacrifice, anyways.) Since Reese's opinions of the miniaturized Scales had begun making their rounds of the building in the wake of the security footage, the brat had refused to listen to anything the disgraced security captain had to say. If not for the fact that he was the only one who could control the child, Philips would have been sacrificed on that particular altar.

If that particular dilemma wasn't bad enough, Child Protective Services had started breathing down his neck. The head of the department was a bit of a pit bull when she was on a crusade…rather like Dana Faraday, come to think of it. He'd allowed one of the tamer representatives in to speak with Dominic yesterday afternoon, just to stall CPS for a little bit longer. (And the new doctor, Luther or something like that, had turned the caseworker away. Well…that wasn't _his_ fault that the doctor had cited medical necessity over CPS' authority.) It hadn't helped matters. CPS still wanted more information, and was threatening legal action if they couldn't speak with the brat themselves. If only they cared this much about every other child in Palm City…

Unfortunately for his business, and for the project, Child Protective Services hadn't fallen under the jurisdiction of the police. He'd have gladly taken them over as well—the department was always woefully underpaid, which was a pity. And if they _had_ fallen under the jurisdiction of the police, he would've shut down their attempts to learn _anything_ about the miniaturized Scales…

There had to be some way he could turn this situation back to his advantage…

Fleming paused at that thought, fingers poised over the keyboard. Orwell's blog had been hounding him for months, but no one had taken the blogger seriously (not until the Cape had appeared in Palm City), but… He sighed and rubbed his temples. This was why he'd enjoyed Chess as a presence in his head. The blog had never, to his knowledge, actually sent a representative to press conferences that he'd held at ARK Towers. (Alright, he could understand that. The blog _was_ trying to destroy his life, after all.)

He groaned under his breath and rubbed his temples. This idea was giving him a headache the more he contemplated it. Hell, it was destined to end very, very badly…but it was probably his only option left, short of denying everything.

(If he tried that tactic, the press would eat him for breakfast.)

The billionaire sat back in his seat, contemplating the possible scenarios. On the one hand, Orwell could send a representative, and post something on the blog that was grudgingly polite. On the other, he would most likely post a blistering diatribe that had everyone baying for ARK's blood.

Fleming sighed and slouched. Chess would have enjoyed this problem, he thought with a small smile, before shaking the thought away. His alter-ego was gone (not for good, as Samuel had probably been lying about reintegration). He'd have to solve this one on his own…

Fleming leaned forward and pressed the call button on his intercom. After a few seconds, his secretary in the anteroom responded. Fleming smiled, although the woman couldn't see it. "Anne, I want a press officer and the head of Public Relations in my office in the next five minutes."

_-Yes sir-_ Anne replied. The connection shut off, and Fleming sat back to wait.

Within three minutes, a press officer and the head of the PR department were seated across from him. The press officer was a fresh-faced young thing, and looked far too excited. Fleming put a mental bet on her career not lasting more than a week. The head of the Public Relations department was a thin, weasel-like man who looked incredibly nervous about being in the same room as his employer.

Well, at least the man was intelligent…

Fleming waited for his employees to settle down before presenting his proposal. "Due to…recent events," he said with a grimace, "I feel the need for…unorthodox measures." Neither visitor needed to ask what recent events were. They did, however, share a look at Fleming's mention of unorthodox methods. Wisely, they said nothing.

"Orwell's blog has been grating on my nerves for some time. However," he allowed himself a small grin, "I've realized that they've never actually sent a reporter or even a proxy to press conferences. I want one or the other to come to ARK Towers, so they can gather firsthand information on the project themselves."

"Right…"the younger of the two muttered under her breath. She smiled brightly at Fleming, who made a go-on gesture. "You realize that Orwell, or whoever he sends, is going to be triple-checking for traps every step of the way, and they'll take anything they see with a grain of salt." She sighed and rubbed her temples, ignoring the _shut up_ gestures her boss was making. "How does this work again?"

The head of PR sighed and buried his face in his hands. Fleming actually had to smile at that.

"Well," he said, leaning forward with a smile, "that's your job."

"Cool."

After thirty minutes of explaining what he wanted them to do, in very basic terms, the two press officers left, discussing different plans of action under their breath. Fleming looked down at the paperwork that Anne had left on his desk halfway through the impromptu meeting and sighed. His work was never done…

After a few minutes, Fleming rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably. What...? He looked around the wide-open office and rolled his eyes. Just for a second, it'd felt like someone was watching him. Just his imagination…

- o -

A month ago, if Philips had had a day off, he would have spent it at home, alternating between long naps and watching football games that his wonderful girlfriend had recorded for him while he was at work. After Kia got off work, he'd meet her at the public defender's office and take her out to dinner somewhere. If she wasn't dead tired or thinking along other lines, he'd take her to a movie as well—although, during the fall, she dragged him to watch hockey games that he had no interest in. After that, the two of them would return to their apartment in South Palm (better known as the art district). And probably yell at the neighbors sometime around midnight to turn their goddamn stereos off…

But that was a month ago, and this was now. Philips had gotten up that morning and instead of rolling over and going back to sleep like he usually did, the security guard hauled himself out of bed. Kia had left for work over an hour ago, judging by how cold her side of the bed was. There was a pot of coffee brewing in the kitchen when Philips stumbled in, however. He tightened the belt on his much-loved bathrobe and picked up his coffee mug. There was a note taped to the side that made him smile as he read it.

_Good morning sleeping beauty. If you can read this, the coffee is nearly done. If not…put your butt back in bed, mister!_

Philips had to laugh at that. His girlfriend definitely had a sense of humor. At least she wasn't mad at him this week… (Last week, on Friday, she'd threatened to dump him because he spent more time at work than he did with her. Even his less-than-stellar attempts to explain that everyone at ARK was working double and occasionally _triple_ shifts, hadn't helped his case. Come to think of it, he'd spent most of last week sleeping on the couch.)

As the security guard waited for the coffee to finish brewing, he stretched and lumbered around the kitchen in search of something edible to eat. After his foraging had only turned up a half-eaten box of cereal and not much else, he made a mental note to go grocery shopping. Kia had probably been eating take-out from that weird little Chinese bistro down the block… No wonder she was so mad at him. She hated that restaurant, but it was the only one that would deliver and wouldn't charge a fortune. (The only thing Kia had managed to make in the eighteen months they'd been dating, without necessitating a call to the fire department, was coffee.)

Philips sipped on his mug of freshly-brewed coffee, reveling in the heat and the rush of caffeine that jumpstarted his brain. Along with groceries and planning an evening for two, he had some work-related things to do. (Sexton and Reese were going to pay for dumping that project on him…. Oh yes, they would pay…) Sawyer wanted and shred of information dug up from the public records related to Scales, circa 1983. According to what Philips had managed to pry out of the quiet boy—Jesus, the brat was practically a mute!—he'd been in Palm City. There was a three week window to search, although it was debatable as to whether the miniature had been there in late summer or early fall.

He groaned and slouched down on the sofa in his living room. He could have spent his day off snoozing or lounging around the apartment, but no… Reese had to dump this load of crap on him! Lazy bastard was…

Philips sighed. If he had to be completely honest with himself, he _did_ want to know what the brat had been up to nearly twenty years ago. Anything to explain why Scales was still so goddamn violent as a kid… Philips winced as the rim of his mug bumped the bridge of his still-healing nose. Scales had an incredibly hard head. It was days like these that he almost wished the older one was still around. At least the older one was easier to contain—and he'd only been prone to uncontrolled gun violence and a lot of bellowing, as opposed to outright physical attacks.

He could have kept his nose intact.

The security guard sighed and contemplated blowing off work tomorrow, just so he could catch some more sleep. Hell, he could cook dinner for Kia again. Except that the novelty would wear off when Sawyer had him canned for being a shiftless lay-about. With another groan, Philips heaved himself off the couch and stumbled back towards his and Kia's bedroom. He might as well get dressed, and grab a donut on from the coffee shop in the apartment complex's lobby before heading for the records office.

Twenty minutes and a short shower later, Philips was walking towards the nearest bus stop, munching on a glazed donut. It was a little stale and made him wish he'd grabbed a cup of coffee, but at least it was food. His stomach wasn't growling as much either. He sat down on the bench inside the little shelter, and wished that his truck weren't in the shop. (Stupid fuckin' vigilante had torn the damn door off, and the shop was taking forever…)

He shoved his hands in his pockets. A month ago, he could have worn his uniform out in public without risking getting shot at. These days, he had to be really careful about what he wore out in public unless he was at ARK Towers. Kia had made him promise to keep his badge hidden after the gang war picked up. She didn't want to have to identify him at the morgue some day because he'd been an idiot.

The gang war had quieted down in the wake of the adult smuggler's arrest, only to flare up again after…whatever the hell had happened, happened. According to one of ARK's sources (who was still among the living, amazingly enough), the new war was over who was going to seize control of the docks and the shipment coming in from the South Pacific. No one really cared that Michael Kaczanowiczk, aka Kazzie, had taken temporary control of the docks. The shipment was probably some new drug those freaks were going to flood the streets with anyways.

Philips climbed into the bus, waved his bus pass at the card reader, and headed for the back of the bus. The driver gave him a dirty look as he walked by, but Philips ignored it. He was getting used to that. ARK wasn't going to be well-liked for awhile. One would have thought that them taking custody of a miniaturized Scales would have given them a little bit of leeway, but no…

Fifteen minutes later, the security guard disembarked from the bus at the city courthouse. Although he had no idea where to start, he could always go to Kia and ask her. She knew her way around files, didn't she…?

- o -

"No way in hell, Jacob."

Philips stared at his girlfriend for a few minutes, and resisted the urge to start pouting. Kia was working through the stack of paperwork for another case, and was completely ignoring him. It wasn't fair! (Okay, maybe it was. He just didn't want to admit it.) He took a look around his girlfriend's office as he tried to compose a reply, and reevaluated his opinion of her job. At least he didn't have so much paperwork…and had room in his cubicle (if he could ever find it, considering how much time he spent in the pit or on the science levels these days) for a coffeepot. Was there even room for one in this cramped little box? Maybe if she got rid of the ugly potted plant…

The off-duty security guard sighed and stared intently at his girlfriend. "Please?" he asked, realizing that he was whining a little, and gave her his best puppy dog eyes. "I won't ever ask for anything again, I swear, I—"

"Oh? So it's like last week," Kia butted in, putting her pen into the chipped blue coffee mug next to her computer. "I seem to recall you swearing that you'd never ask me for anything if I burned all of the Pilot's games to a DVD so you could watch them at work. Or the week before that, when you—"

"I get it!" Philips yelped, holding up his hands to cut her off. "Alright! Uncle, uncle!" He sighed and stared at her. "Geeze Kia. You're a little touchy over me just wanting to see some files…" He ducked the crumpled up paper boll Kia tossed at his head and smiled at her. "Come on," he wheedled. "You know you want to…"

"Fine," Kia replied, and held up a hand to forestall any response from her boyfriend. "In return, you are taking me out to a nice restaurant and we're going to see a movie that I want. After that, we're going home, where you're going to do whatever I tell you to. Without arguing," she added darkly.

Philips grinned at his girlfriend. It probably wasn't going to go the way he hoped tonight, but damn if he couldn't dream. However… "So…I suppose you don't want these, then?" he asked, holding up a pair of tickets. He'd gotten them months ago when he'd heard the show was coming into Palm City, just in case he needed to bribe Kia or make her feel better… He waved them in front of her face, grinning as her eyes widened in surprise.

"How the hell did you get those?" she hissed. "That show's been sold out for months!" Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Did you abuse your power to get those? Because you know I don't—"

"I got them when I heard the show was coming in," Philips replied, holding his hands up defensively as he placated Kia. "Does this mean I'm not sleeping on the couch again?" he asked with an impish grin, standing up. At Kia's nod, he leaned over the desk and kissed her. "So, about those files…"

Half an hour later, Philips was seated at a small table in the records room, poring over files from the summer and fall of 1983. They were dry enough to make him wish for a text book, and inconclusive enough to have him in tears. The only thing of interest he'd found was something on the arrival of Max Malini in Palm City with his carnival. Oh, and a bit about some moron setting off an unauthorized fireworks display, but that had been discarded after he read the date—July 4th, 2003. He tossed it into the pile of misfiles that he'd found (seven of them).

"What the…" Philips flipped back through the last three pages he'd read in another boring file and tried to concentrate on the words.

_10 August, 1983: Sergeant Vincent Faraday has voiced suspicions concerning Thomas Grayson. (See page seven for details). It is the opinion of…_

What the hell was this about? Philips flipped to page seven of the file and continued reading.

_Grayson was previously charged with abducting three young children between 1978 and 1982, although these allegations were never proven. The children were returned to their homes safe and sound, with no evidence of abuse. Sergeant Faraday has reasonable suspicion that Grayson has abducted another child and…_

"Son of a bitch," Philips muttered under his breath as he read the last few details on page seven. He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed his superior's number from memory. Sawyer was going to have a field day with this…

- o -

Vince returned to the lair shortly after sunset that evening, feeling an impending sense of doom as he closed the door behind him. He'd had a long patrol, made even longer by the fact that everyone in Palm City who owned a gun seemed to have aligned with one of the gangs. He'd stopped three drug deals, rescued a prostitute, and had been shot at thirty-six—no, thirty-_eight_ times in the space of an hour.

He'd looked forward to returning to the lair so much… Hell, he'd been in such a good mood that he'd stopped to pick up an evening newspaper while he was still in costume. And then he'd seen the headline on the evening edition of the _Palm City Herald_. Fleming had a truly magnificent pair, and Orwell was going to murder him when he showed her the headline…

The vigilante sighed as he saw Orwell slouched over her keyboard, nursing a mug of coffee and an open bottle of Tylenol. Those migraines were _seriously_ starting to worry him now… What had the Lich's toxin done to her during those four days? He smiled sadly and folded the evening paper in half, and tucked it under his arm. The vigilante walked over to the desk full of computers that his partner usually inhabited during the time she spent in his lair.

As Vince walked over, he noticed that his three coffeepots were empty and he was out of coffee again—coffee _and_ whole bean. Orwell had been in the lair for awhile, then… He had the nagging feeling this wasn't going to end well for him. The last time she'd had this much of his coffee, he'd learned that Dana and some of his buddies from Afghanistan were the only ones who _weren't_ bothered by his snoring… Was it too late to run like hell for the carnival?

"Hi Vince," Orwell muttered dully, eyes flicking up from one of the glowing monitor screens briefly. She looked tired and haggard, and had dark rings under her eyes. Jesus Christ—how had he missed his partner getting in this bad of a shape? The blogger took another sip of her coffee, and didn't seem to notice Vince's look of concern.

Vince smiled at her, feeling a bit glum. He grabbed his chair from the Command Center and straddled it, resting his chin on his forearms. "Hey Orwell," he replied. The vigilante held the paper against his side, praying that the headline wasn't showing. "How's the blog going?" he asked, not wanting to draw Orwell's ire by asking her how she was. (The last time he'd done that, she'd gone on a rant about how she didn't need him mothering her.)

The blogger shrugged, distracted by something on her monitor. She typed a few things, and turned her attention back to Vince. "It's doing alright." Orwell peered at him for a few seconds, eyes narrowed in concern. "Do you need a doctor?"

Vince started, surprised by the question. "No! Why?" He looked down at himself, wondering if Orwell had spotted some injury he hadn't noticed. He'd gotten immune to most of the pain involved with vigilantism months ago—mostly from getting pummeled by Rollo and Scales if he were down on the docks—so it was possible that he'd missed an injury… Orwell's reply answered his panicked thoughts.

"I saw people shooting at you earlier," Orwell replied, sounding distant and distracted again. The blogger changed topics almost immediately, before Vince could reply. "Did you know that Peter Fleming is piping almost three million a week into the time travel project? And most of it is…" She trailed off, distracted by something in a new line of text. "That can't be right…" she muttered.

"Most of the funding is what?" Vince asked curiously, leaning forward to read the information over Orwell's shoulder. The blogger rolled her eyes and shifted her chair to the left of the bank of monitors so the vigilante could scoot his chair forward. Vince caught a look at what had so fascinated Orwell and blinked.

"I don't even wanna know," Vince muttered under his breath, shaking his head in disbelief.

Orwell muttered something along the same lines under her breath and pulled up another document on the monitor directly in front of Vince. She looked over at the vigilante to see if he was paying attention and caught a glimpse of the paper he was holding against his side. The blogger gently pried the paper out of his grip and unfolded it to read the front page. If Vince had brought it back to the lair, but was going to the trouble of hiding it something important must have…made…

No. Way. In. Hell.

"Ah hell," Vince muttered, seeing his partner perusing the evening paper's headline. Why had he brought it home with him, instead of throwing it out? This wasn't going to end well… _ Your honor_, he thought mentally, _I'd like to plead not guilty by reason of temporary insanity…_

"Peter Fleming has no shame…" Orwell muttered under her breath. She tossed the paper onto the Command Center in disgust. It fell headline-up onto the tabletop.

The headline was trumpeting Fleming's latest public relation's move. It was, as far as the press was concerned, pure _gold_. He'd invited the investigative blogger known as Orwell to have a first-hand _personal_ tour of the "time travel" project's temporary headquarters. Fleming himself would be conducting the tour.

Vince sighed. Fleming had a pair on him, alright. And, judging by the look on Orwell's face, this was going to be a long, _long_ night…

- o - o -

So, chapter five wraps up. What did you think? Good? Bad? Horrible plot contrivances forcing uninteresting plot twists? Drop a line and let me know!

- o - o -

An important notice: I will not be updating every week, starting in November due to NaNoWriMo. Updates will be once every two weeks, or dependant on how long it takes me to reach my daily word count. I apologzie to my readers who were looking forward to a new chapter next week. A new chapter of The Call will be up by late Saturday evening, with luck.

-IA


	6. Reconstruction

Hey! I've finally updated! NaNo is over for the year, and my sanity returned. Have a new chapter to celebrate!

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o - o -

Chapter Six: Reconstruction

Vince watched his partner dash around the lair, collecting miscellaneous items that ranged from extra pens to the acorn camera she'd used months ago during the train incident. The vigilante poured another mug of coffee and sat down at the command center, and smirked at his frantic partner.

"You know," he said conversationally as he sipped on his coffee, "This is completely nuts." Vince ducked a pen that Orwell threw at his head and laughed. "I mean, don't you find _anything_ suspicious about Fleming inviting you—well, one of your "legions of reporters"—right into the heart of ARK Towers a bit suspicious?"

Orwell glowered at him, although the effect was ruined by the thick-rimmed black glasses she was wearing.

"Seriously, Fleming's got a game," Vince said, sobering instantly. "And why the hell am I being the paranoid one, anyways?" The concern was gone, replaced by a humorously perplexed expression.

The blogger stared at him, a distant look on her face. Obviously she had zoned out to whatever planet she lived on when she wasn't occupying her body. It was really annoying some days…

"What exactly makes you think he's not hoping to trap Orwell?" Vince asked, setting his empty coffee mug on the table. Orwell gave him a look that was clearly questioning his intelligence.

She had paused in her mad dash around the lair, and was staring at him. "Vince," she said, "Fleming wants me to validate what he's doing. To get the press off his back," the blogger added, seeing Vince's expression. "He's not going to risk making me—well, Orwell—angry because of an arrest."

Orwell sighed and ran her hands through her incredibly short hair, which had been bleached until it was nearly white. It was a shame, in Vince's opinion. He couldn't understand why his partner was going to such lengths to keep her identity hidden, but he had to admire the effect. If he hadn't helped her with the transformation the night before, he wouldn't have known who she was. The thick-rimmed glasses and blue contacts only added to the disguise she had created.

"Right," Vince muttered, still unconvinced. Orwell had a distant look on her face again, and was no longer paying attention to the vigilante. After a few seconds, she came back to reality and smiled.

"Don't worry Vince," she said. "I'll be fine. And Ruvi will be with me. Nothing's going to happen."

"That's what I'm afraid of," Vince muttered as his partner left the lair with a mug of espresso, presumably for Ruvi. He sighed and stumbled back into bed. His cell phone was charged, and Orwell would send a distress call if the Cape was needed.

He really hoped he wasn't needed…

- o -

Philips paced around the monitor room of the time travel project's new home, gnawing on his lower lip nervously. Excluding the fact that Orwell—the effing blogger who'd started the effing chaos currently happening at ARK Towers that was driving everyone nuts right now—was sending a photographer and one of his many reporters into ARK's headquarters, there was nothing wrong.

A quick look at the monitors told him that Dominic was nibbling on a slice of toast, eyes darting nervously around the room. Philips made a mental note to beat McClintock a bit harder, if the team assigned to finding him ever produced tangible results. They were currently looking in Acapulco, for some reason… Lucky bastards.

According to office rumor, Philips thought as he pulled himself away from a day dream of a Mexican beach, Orwell had hacked into Mr. Fleming's private communications channel. As to what had been said, there was no concrete evidence; it was generally assumed, though, that Orwell had announced he was taking the billionaire up on his invitation. Philips still wasn't sure if that was going to be a good thing or a bad thing in the long run. Thus, he was pacing and trying very hard not to panic.

However the situation turned out, Philips thought, it wasn't going to end well for the kid.

The security officer stopped pacing at that thought, and shot a dark look at the elevator doors. This entire situation was Sawyers' fault, and—by extension—Fleming's. If he hadn't been dragged out of bed at two in the morning nearly two weeks ago, he wouldn't be developing big brother-type feelings for a miniaturized version of a guy who'd nearly killed him.

(It was a pity, according to pretty much everyone in the security division, that Scales hadn't offed Reese while he had the chance. There was still a pool going on whether or not the kid was going to kill the man, though.)

Philips sighed, rubbing his face with both hands. He honestly had no idea when the duo was supposed to arrive, but he hoped it was soon. Coffee was not helping the lack of actual sleep he'd gotten last night.

(The musical he'd taken Kia to, as a result of his bribery a few days earlier, had run way longer than it should have. The female lead had twisted her ankle, and it had taken them over an hour to find the understudy. At least he'd gotten a refund on his tickets, thanks to having bought them in advance. Kia's thank-you gift after they'd gotten to the apartment had been…pleasant. But now he was tired, and he wanted more coffee or his bed.)

Philips wiped the smile the memory had produced away, and tried to grimace or at least look unhappy. If he looked happy when the reporters arrived, Orwell Is Watching and the bastard who ran it would warp his smile beyond all recognition. Hell, they'd probably interpret it to mean he'd done something violent to the kid he was guarding.

(The security officer was still struggling to wrap his mind around the fact that anyone could beat a kid as sweet as mini Dominic was. He was also having a bit of trouble comparing sweet, eager-to-please, ten-year-old Dominic with the psychotic gang lord and smuggler Scales. Philips made a mental note to be the first one to get hold of McClintock, and beat the shit out of the man with a shovel.)

Philips jumped when the elevator dinged, announcing the arrival of the long-awaited intrepid duo. At least, Philips hoped it was them. The security officer straightened up automatically and smoothed his shirt back into place. He'd probably be fine (it wasn't like he hadn't already been vilified by the blog, after all), but he was more worried about the brat.

It wasn't all that surprising, though. Over the past few days, Dominic had actually acquired a better attitude towards...everything, to be perfectly honest. He no longer attacked people who startled him, and didn't cower in fear every time someone spoke directly to him. (Hell, he'd even stopped throwing up after eating. A review of security footage over the past two weeks showed that Dominic had been throwing up after the guards left, if he'd gotten something to eat from them. Reese, in a startling show of kindness, had offered to hold McClintock's arms behind his back while the other guards took their turns beating the man senseless.)

This interview, Philips thought as the elevator's door slid open, was most likely going to destroy all progress that had been made towards socializing little Dominic. Doctor Winston had been dead set against any form of interview happening, and had been really put out when he was outvoted. The man had grumbled and been in a general bad mood for the rest of the day after that conversation. Still, he was a better conversationalist than Doctor Putnam, who'd disappeared a few days before Winston was hired.

Philips was surprised to see Mr. Fleming's bodyguard in the elevator with the billionaire and the two he assumed were Orwell's reporters. (Fleming had an annoying habit of leaving his bodyguard in the lobby whenever he was in ARK Towers. His personal guard had a tendency to drink when they were off shift because of that. As far as everyone but Fleming was concerned, it was horrible security on their boss's part.)

The blond girl and her darker companion stepped off the elevator before the CEO of ARK. The male half of the duo was a photographer, and Philips half-wondered if the man was the one who'd taken those oh-so-lovely pictures that had gotten him mugged a few times after they'd gone up on the blog. If this guy was involved with the vigilante _and_ the blogger, Philips would cheerfully throw him in a cell. (One of the muggers had tried to kill him! And if Kia hadn't been his first contact, she would have dumped him for being late! Christ!)

The security officer was startled out of his observations of the photographer—who was now taking pictures of everything in the monitor room—when the blond girl marched right over to him. She thrust her hand out, an expectant look on her face. Philips shook it awkwardly, wincing as she nearly crushed his hand. She was strong for someone so….tiny. Did she bench-press trucks in her spare time or something? Ouch.

"Hi, I'm Julia Graham," she said in a bubbly tone, finally introducing herself as she released Philips' hand. Julia Graham had one hell of a Valley Girl accent. Combined with the blond bob, she kind of reminded him of a slightly less perky version of Snookie from Jersey Shore. (He shuddered at the thought, remembering that Palm City was supposed to be getting a reality show at some point. Dana Faraday probably hadn't gotten wind of the show yet, or there'd have been a serious lawsuit…)

"A pleasure, Miss Graham," Philips replied as cordially as possible, shunting his personal thoughts to the back of his mind again. She smiled at him, and Philips winced at the sight of her braces. How old _was_ this kid? He did have to feel sympathy for her though—he'd had them when he was that age. She had to be twelve. There was no other way to describe her, except as a twelve-year-old.

Philips really had to wonder, as Julia began babbling about something, how Orwell had hired the girl in the first place. The blog didn't strike him as the type of publication to hire someone this young, blond and ditzy, without said hireling having _some_ redeeming feature. For the life of him, he just couldn't figure out what it was.

"So I just wanted to say thanks for agreeing to show us around," Julia concluded in the same annoyingly bubbly and cheerful tone. She grabbed her sullen looking partner's shoulder and dragged him over to Philips, away from whatever he'd been taking pictures of. "Anyways, this is Soren, my boyfriend." Julie smiled and kissed Soren on the cheek. "He takes a lot of cool pictures."

All Julia needed to complete the Valley Girl picture was a stick of bright pink bubble gum, or something like that. Philips gave Soren a sympathetic look, which garnered him a silent thank-you in return. He looked just as unhappy as Philips would have been, if Julia were his girlfriend instead of Kia.

Doctor Winston stuck his head out of the door that led to the miniature's room, looking perplexed at everything. "If the reporters are here, we can proceed with our business," he said, scowling at Julia and Soren. Neither of them looked happy to see him either. Still, Philips and the two reporters followed Doctor Winston out of the monitor room and into the room affectionately known as the spider trap.

Philips had to admit, privately, that the doctor had a decent reason to be a bit tetchy. From what he'd heard, the man had been happily retired and living in a beachfront condo in Ochun City when ARK had contacted him with a job offer. No one knew what Fleming had offered the former military doctor, but it had been sufficient to get the crotchety old bastard to leave a six-hundred thousand dollar condo, twelve grandchildren, three great-grandchildren, and retirement behind.

He stopped at the plexi-glass barrier that separated the sunken room from the observation deck, and saw the intrepid duo coming to a pause beside him. Philips rolled his eyes as the camera came out again, but was at least grateful that the flash was off.

Doctor Winston was hobbling around the pit with the aid of a knobby wooden cane, checking readouts from various pieces of medical equipment. The patient whose health he was monitoring was on the bed, laying on his belly as he read a book. Philips was relieved to see the miniaturized Scales acting like a normal kid—it could only help.

At least, he thought as he straightened up, the doctor was good with kids. After the brat had gone into shock a few days ago, no one was taking any chances with his health. (That was probably why Putnam had been fired, come to think of it.)

"Hey doc!" Philips called as soon as Winston was close enough. The doctor looked up, a dark look on his craggy, tanned face. The security officer grinned and waved, then gestured to the two reporters from the blog. "Permission to come down, sir?" he asked.

"Make it quick," Doctor Winston grunted in reply. Philips rolled his eyes, but led the two reporters down. He saw Julia looking around as subtly as possible. Was it just his imagination, or was there a hint of recognition in her eyes?

Orwell was relieved when Fleming left. She was almost too relieved to speak, caught up in the worry that her daddy would somehow recognize his ballerina under the disguise. He hadn't, thankfully, and had left as soon as possible. The bodyguard, someone Orwell didn't recognize, left with him.

Ruvi, sensing Orwell's discomfort, touched her hand gently. When Orwell glanced over, he raised his eyebrows in a silent question. The blogger shrugged and turned away, a light blush on her cheeks. She could at least be grateful that Ruvi—Soren, she reminded herself firmly—was contributing to their cover story, even if he hadn't meant to.

A few minutes later, Philips—the security officer that Vince had nearly killed all those months ago—led them to a sunken room. Orwell recognized the room. It was the back-up for if the project headquarters for mapping Tracey Jarrod's brain ever came under investigation. Now, though, ten years later, there wasn't a trace of pink to be seen.

Everything had been painted a uniform grey color that was, in a word, depressing. The only things that broke up the slate grey paint were a few dark brown bookshelves and the medical equipment. It was extremely Spartan, and if she hadn't known beforehand, she wouldn't have guessed a child was living in this room.

The miniaturized smuggler was belly-down on the bed, reading a book. One of his feet was making lazy circles in the air, and he seemed wholly focused on the text he was reading. Orwell could see that his eyes weren't scanning the text, though, and he was actually tracking Philips and Doctor Winston.

The blogger and hypnotist followed Officer Philips down into the pit. Ruvi was snapping pictures, apparently at random. (He really liked the camera, Orwell decided. She'd seen what he'd managed to do with a disposable though, so it had been no shame to give him a decent Nikon as a bribe.)

The kid looked up when the trio arrived next to his bed. He had a bored look on his face, as though they were taking up too much of his time. The second he saw Philips, though, his face broke into a wide grin. Orwell raised an eyebrow, wondering what hold the man had on the miniaturized smuggler.

Her question was answered a few seconds later when the miniature sat up and smiled widely.

"Uncle Jacob!" he said, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a smile.

Orwell had to remind herself that the smuggler was a child again—the child that Scales had been, years ago—and not a criminal. Despite that, it was almost heart-warming to see him accept a hug from Philips (whose first name was apparently Jacob). She wondered why Officer Philips was allowed such leeway in regards to the personal relationship that had apparently developed, and gave a mental shrug. She'd figure it out later.

The blogger smiled a little and then wiped the smile away as quickly as it had come. As much as she liked the scene she'd just seen, there was no need to let ARK know what she thought of their CEO's pet project. It wasn't healthy.

Philips settled the kid back down on the bed, and hooked his thumbs into the beltloops on his pants. "Those are the reporters I told you about this morning, Nicky," he said, seeing the curious look on the child's face.

Orwell made a mental note of the nickname, and wondered if she could get any of this footage pulled off the security cameras. Blackmail of this caliber was hard to come by… Especially where the deformed smuggler was concerned, of course.

Scales, or Nicky, apparently, looked over at Orwell and Ruvi. There was a slightly contemplative look on his face as he studied them. It wasn't exactly welcoming, but he didn't look overtly hostile either. Maybe the doc had him on a sedative or something…

The blogger took a seat next to the bed and pulled a notebook out of her messenger bag. Philips was talking to the doctor on the other side of the room, for which Orwell was grateful. She looked back at Scales and saw a curious look on his face that vanished a few seconds later. Apparently the reports of suspected abuse weren't rumors after all… Her lips pursed as she contemplated the thought that maybe destroying this project wasn't such a good idea after all. She redirected her thoughts somewhere safer, like details for a new blog post.

"So, Nicky," she said in as warm a tone as she could manage, "How do you—"

"Me name is Dominic, t' you," Scales snapped in an irritated tone. "It ain' Nicky, t' you. An' don' patronize me neither," he added, seeing Orwell about to ask another question. He set his jaw in a stubborn manner, making Orwell snicker under her breath.

"Okay sweetie," the blogger replied, ignoring the comment about patronizing him. "Why don't you tell me what you think of ARK? Do you like it here? Is anyone hurting you?"

Dominic looked up at the ceiling, apparently lost in thought. Orwell wondered if Philips or the doctor had something to do with his reluctance to speak, and looked over at the two suspiciously. She looked back at Dominic, who shrugged noncommittally.

"It's okay, I 'spose," he replied. His voice was much lighter than his older counterpart's had been, much lighter than his size would have suggested. "McClin'ock ain't 'ere, an' the cozzers are dam—darn sight be'er than the ones from Palm City."

Orwell grinned when she caught sight of the gimlet eye Scales had gotten from Philips. While it was worrisome that ARK had their hooks in a vulnerable kid, it _was_ funny to see. She was surprised though, to learn that Scales had been in Palm City thirty years ago, long enough to come in contact with the police. She'd always thought he'd crawled out of a sewer somewhere as a fully-fledged criminal… Apparently even the bad guys had back stories.

"Who's McClintock?" she asked, latching onto a new thread to keep herself out of her own thoughts. Despite what she'd told Vince, the drugs hadn't gone away completely. She really didn't want to get lost in her thoughts. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Philips perk up imperceptibly. Ruvi, catching onto the blogger's mood, snapped a few pictures of the surprised-looking security guard.

Dominic scowled at her. Philips seemed to be holding his breath as well, waiting for an answer. What hadn't the kid said, regarding McClintock? Orwell flipped to another page in her massive spiral bound notebook and wrote the heading of "McClintock" while she waited for an answer.

"None of your effing business, berk," Dominic replied in a much more hostile tone. Orwell blinked in surprise. Whatever response she'd been expecting, it hadn't included swearing. Her cheeks colored as she realized what the last insult actually was.

Philips cleared his throat, drawing a scared look from Dominic. Orwell forgot her embarrassment over the insult and nudged Ruvi. The hypnotist sighed and took some more shots of the interaction. What Orwell was going to do with this, he didn't know. She just owed him a lot of money.

"Sorry," Dominic muttered under his breath. Orwell raised an eyebrow at how quickly Dominic recanted and apologized. This was gonna be fun…

Fleming was in the elevator when Orwell and Ruvi left the project's headquarters half an hour later. The only useful thing the blogger had gotten out of the interview (which had tanked after Dominic's apology) were some half-way decent pictures. Everything else she'd gotten amounted to more questions than she wanted to ask in the hour she'd gotten for the interview. Philips had done a decent job of stonewalling her attempts to ask more probing questions, the blogger had to admit with a grudging amount of respect.

Orwell stood stiffly next to the billionaire, wondering how a company as wealthy as ARK couldn't have invested in larger elevators. She would have thought daddy would have invested in something larger, considering he was five times wealthier than he had been when she'd run away.

She was also silently praying that he didn't recognize her, underneath the disguise. He hadn't recognized her on the Monte Carlo train, but he hadn't actually been looking for her at that point. Now, though… She sighed and chewed on her lower lip. Only another ten floors to go…

Fleming cleared his throat quietly, drawing Orwell's attention. She looked over at him, eyebrows raised. He smiled back, making the blogger wonder how long of a shower she'd have to take to scrub the first layer of skin off… (That smile was entirely too creepy, but at least proved he hadn't recognized her through the disguise.)

"I do hope you found everything to your satisfaction, Miss Graham," Fleming said. Orwell shuddered at the oily tone—she'd heard him use it at political functions she'd been dragged to as a little girl, and it had only gotten creepier with time.

"Yep," she chirped, trying to sound as chipper as possible. She wasn't Orwell right now, she was supposed to be the bubbly Julia Graham.

"Of course," Fleming replied, smiling the politician-smile again. "Do let me know if you ever want another interview," he added as the elevator came to a rest at long last. He smiled as Orwell and Ruvi left. After they were gone, he turned to Philips.

"What did the little pick pocket upstairs take from them?" Fleming asked, tone colder. Philips rubbed the back of his neck with a mental sigh. The pick pocketing seemed to be an annoying habit of Dominic's. They'd only discovered it a few days ago, after he'd swiped a guard's wallet and security card. The only reason they'd learned about it was because the guard had alerted building security after failing to find his card while trying to leave shift. A janitor had found the miniature three floors below the level he should have been on, attempting to get to the lobby.

"Just some IDs," Philips replied finally. "He put them back without them noticing, though," the security officer added, seeing the dark look cross his boss' face. Maybe that letter he'd asked Kia to notarize was going to be handier than he thought in the near future…

"Good. I don't need any trouble with this project," Fleming said. Philips took the elevator back up to the project's base after Fleming left, weak-kneed in relief. His relief was short-lived when he re-entered the lab, though, and heard Dominic arguing with Doctor Winston.

"What do you mean, those IDs were fake?"

Philips sighed. It was going to be one of those days…

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Needed more action after such a long break? Drop a line and let me know!


	7. Unwelcome News

Hey! It's a new chapter! And holy shit, is that a plot?

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter Seven: Unwelcome News

Vince lounged on the bleachers in the big top in Trolley Park, enjoying a rarity for a Monday morning: Hot breakfast. In the five weeks since Scales had somehow become a child again, he'd had exactly two hot breakfasts. (They had consisted of hot coffee and dry toast. Both breakfasts served as reminders that he really needed to invest in a deep freezer or something, because the mini fridge wasn't cutting it anymore.)

Today, Raia had dragged him out of his cave at the crack of dawn to help set things up for a show later that day. She'd promised him hot breakfast in return for helping set up the rigging, and had definitely delivered. Vince slouched down on his seat, munching on another slice of toast. The animal trainer was an amazing cook, and made some pretty good coffee too. He'd never had chutney or fried eggplant, but it was pretty good.

The vigilante was pretty sure his partner was sleeping in today. Orwell had been in a bad mood when she'd gotten back to the lair yesterday, and sporting what looked suspiciously like a bite mark on one hand. (She's refused to discuss it, and had thrown a pen at his head when he asked about it.) The problems of the day were compounded when the blogger and Ruvi both realized their IDs—the fake IDs they'd made two days beforehand—were missing.

Vince was fairly sure they'd just misplaced them somewhere in the Cadillac Orwell had been driving. He'd gotten a noncommittal grunt in reply. Despite his assurances, he wasn't too sure that was the case. The bad feeling in his gut wasn't going away as easily as it should have…

He sat bolt upright in surprise when an animal that sort of resembled a dog loped into the big top. The vigilante assumed it was one of Raia's animals—the ones she'd trained to rob banks and armored cars—except that she looked as surprised as he was to see it. There was a small flash of recognition in her eyes, and it wasn't happy. Vince stood up, wondering if he should be worried about the…dog-creature. What was that thing, anyways?

Vince's silent question was answered when Max came into the main section of the big top a few minutes later, Popo trailing behind him. There was a tight look on Max's face, as though the dog-like creature were the worst thing to happen since Scales had shot him months ago. Nearly everyone in the big top could feel the waves of anger rolling off the magician, and it had them nervous.

Whatever the dog represented, it wasn't anything good. Before any of the performers could ask Max what was wrong, the magician had grabbed the dog by the scruff of the neck and was dragging it back to the trailer that served as his office.

Vince looked at Raia, who had been working with a new raccoon when the animal loped in. She shrugged. The animal trainer had no idea what the dog represented either; she jerked her head towards Max's trailer, silently telling Vince to eavesdrop.

His curiosity piqued, Vince slid off the bleachers as quietly as possible and loped towards Max's trailer. What was up this time, and why was Max involved? (Alright, it was _Max_, but still… The cop in him just couldn't ignore this situation; that, and the perpetual snoop in him wanted answers.)

He slunk closer to the ground when he got to the trailer and crept under the window he'd broken months ago, during his training with the cloak. Max hadn't bothered to repair the window yet, claiming he liked the breeze that came through occasionally. This made it the ideal location to eavesdrop on Max, on occasion. The vigilante leaned against the trailer wall, head cocked so he could listen to the faint conversation. What he heard only perplexed him more than it should have.

- o – o -

Max sat down at his desk, staring at the all-too familiar dog with a dark scowl on his face. "So, Deveraux," he said after he'd calmed down some, "What are you doing here?" The dog grinned at him, tongue lolling out one side of its mouth. Max sighed, rubbing his temples wearily. He'd forgotten that shapeshifting had a tendency to scramble the shifter's intelligence somewhat. After a few seconds, he picked up a knife. There was one way to get through to the young idiot.

"You know, I can always—"

The dog let out a surprised yelp. A few seconds later, there was a cloud of smoke, accompanied by the faint smell of rotten eggs and something that smelled like burning hair. When the smoke cleared, a young man was sitting on the floor of his office, wearing nothing but a goofy grin on his face. He had several tattoos on his collarbone and one around his eye that was glowing slightly. The glow finally faded, and the young man smiled, stretching.

"I despise that name, you know," he said as he stood up. Deveraux didn't seem to realize he wasn't wearing anything, and if he did, he didn't seem to care. "You just had to steal my name back in Russia, didn't you?" he added, catching the heavy red robe that Max threw at him. "Thank you Max," Deveraux smirked. He pulled the robe on and tightened the sash around his waist before sitting back down. The young man looked quite at ease with himself, all things considered.

"Of course you do, Ilya," Max replied, ignoring the accusation. "Still up to your tricks, brat?"

Ilya Deveraux smirked, looking quite pleased with himself. Max resisted the urge to turn his visitor into something—a frog, perhaps—and concentrated on the fact that Deveraux had arrived sooner than he would have thought, all things considered. Or… No, even Deveraux wouldn't have been _that_ stupid.

"I heard your champion had finally been selected," Deveraux replied, studying his fingers with a miniscule frown. "Is there something I should know?" he asked absently, picking some dirt out from beneath a fingernail.

Max rubbed his temples and again reminded himself why he shouldn't do something horrible to the pseudo-French magician. "You've made two moves within the last twenty years," he finally replied, staring at Deveraux between his fingers. "In fact, you were the one who selected a champion nearly twenty years ago. Why shouldn't I make my move?"

Before Deveraux could reply, the trailer door opened. A young man with curly blond hair entered, a confused look on his face. Deveraux looked at Max, one eyebrow raised; the other magician shook his head in a silent rebuke.

Deveraux smirked at Max and stood up. The younger magician circled Vince like a predatory animal. "Max, who is this delightful treat?" he asked, eyeing Vince appreciatively. Max muttered something into his hands that was no doubt obscene and directed at his guest.

"Max," Vince asked, resisting the urge to shudder, "Who is this guy?" There was something odd about this guy, and it wasn't the shape shifting. (Although he was still having trouble wrapping his mind around that fact—that a man could, in defiance of the laws of logic and reality, turn himself into a dog.)

"Deveraux, this is Vincent, my apprentice," Max said, giving more formal introductions. Deveraux pouted as he realized the implications. "Vincent, this is Deveraux, an old friend. He smuggles snake wine on occasion." Deveraux's eyebrows rose a fraction, before the expression of curiosity vanished under a mask of casual boredom again.

He sat down with a glum expression, as though Max had taken a favorite toy away from him. After a few seconds, he smiled again. "So, what are your terms, this century?" he asked, ignoring Vince's curious expression.

"Same as last time," Max replied. He flicked his fingers at Vince, and the vigilante froze in place. The magician sighed. "You know I'm going to have to erase this conversation from his memory?" he added, scowling at Deveraux. "I despise doing that, more than I have to. The doctor was bad enough…"

"You got shot again, didn't you?" Deveraux sounded positively gleeful.

"Shut up."

- o – o -

Fleming sat in his office, going over the reports from the time-travel project. The medical reports were at the bottom of the pile; Doctor Winston was sitting across from him. The doctor looked at ease with the world, despite the fact that the information in the reports he'd brought upstairs had the high chance of getting him fired.

The billionaire eyed the physician for a few minutes, before returning his attention to the reports. Physically speaking, there was very little wrong with the child five floors below—he was recovering from the injuries he'd arrived with at a phenomenal speed.

On the other hand, though… Scales, in Fleming's opinion, had never been a very stable individual. Given the notes he was now reading in the inch-thick psychological report, it was amazing that the adult had been as functional as he was. (What did _not exhibiting some of the usual tendencies_ mean, anyways?) There was nothing that was cause for extreme worry, though. Scales was highly responsive to any kind of praise, and responded negatively to the guards who wore belts.

Fleming sighed and tossed the file back onto the desk. Aside from the psych profile, there was also the matter of the wallets the brat had nicked from Orwell's people. They were, as the boy had said, fake. How he had known that from a five-second glance when it had taken ARK's people five hours to reach the same conclusion, Fleming didn't know.

That led him to the question of why the IDs had been faked.

Had one of the reporters been Orwell? Had he, in fact, let the blogger himself waltz in and out of ARK Towers without so much as a second glance? Orwell must have been the photographer… Fleming rubbed his temples wearily. The photographer must have been Orwell, and he'd waltzed through security without so much as a nervous twitch.

The possibility that Orwell could have been the ditzy little blond girl had been discarded almost immediately. He and Chess did agree that she resembled their missing daughter, but… There was no way she could have been Orwell. She was a bit…out there, for someone as nigh omnipotent as Orwell seemed to be.

_And you're still an idiot._

There was that problem too. Fleming settled back in his seat, hoping that Winston hadn't noticed his nervous jump. He had more than enough problems on his plate at the moment, what with the gang war.

The annoyingly familiar voice in the back of his head was never going to leave. Chess was back, and Doctor Samuel was going to pay dearly. The homicidal maniac had come back because a deal between them had been broken. Fleming wondered how badly he could maim his psychiatrist before the man expired from the blood loss.

_How sweet_, Chess cooed in a sickeningly sweet manner. _One might think you actually _cared_ about me!_

The billionaire sighed and buried his face in his hands. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Winston shooting him a concerned look. Fleming resisted the urge to set Chess loose, just to get his alter-ego to shut up for a few hours.

Samuel was the cause of this, after all, not Winston. (That, and there was also the fact that Doctor Winston, despite his grumbling, was a surprisingly decent influence on the brat downstairs. Fleming wanted Scales malleable, not a basket case.)

_Just kill everyone_ Chess grumbled. Fleming ignored the maniac and looked up at Doctor Winston.

"Why exactly are you requesting funds for this?" the billionaire asked, pointing to the item on the requisition packet. Doctor Winston shrugged noncommittally.

"My granddaughter trains therapy dogs," Winston explained, sitting upright in his chair. "I don't see any harm in bringing one in for a day or two." He smiled, spreading his hands wide. "With all due respect sir, this is probably the best chance you will ever have to get Dominic to open up about anything. Even on the subject of how he arrived in the present day, he is recalcitrant. In my experience, I've found that children respond better when given proper _gentle_ motivation."

Fleming didn't miss the stress on the word gentle, and raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "And the reason you aren't simply forcing the information out of him?" he asked. Doctor Winston snorted.

"You could also give him a root canal and get the same results," Winston replied. Even though he was joking, there was an undercurrent of dead seriousness in the words. "With all due respect, sir," he continued, dropping the joking tone, "that is an incredibly bad idea. If you try that, you may as well kiss your entire project goodbye."

_He has a point, you know…_

Fleming sighed. If Chess was agreeing with someone, he wasn't going to be able to fight both sides. Chess was a menace to be sure (and he really would have loved to have the psychopath gone for good), but he was intuitive about many things.

"Fine," he said. "Anne, fill out the doctor's requisition." Doctor Winston and Anne saw the dismissal for what it was and left without another word. The billionaire sat back in his seat and stared out the floor to ceiling windows in front of him.

_You could always hold the brat off the balcony until he gives everything up_, Chess said, _but I somehow get the impression that you want him alive. Oh, and I don't like your little plan to get rid of me again. It hurts_.

If it were possible, Fleming could practically imagine his alter-ego pouting like a child on Christmas.

"And you're a menace," Fleming replied, smirking.

_Oh that's just wonderful. I feel _so_ appreciated…_

The maniac's presence in the back of his mind faded before the billionaire could concoct a decent retort. He sighed and slouched in his chair. This was just a great day, wasn't it? He'd almost wish for the old Scales back, just so he could convince the thug to move his explosives. Or lord the bastard's worthlessness over him…

Fleming rubbed his temples. If it weren't for the fact that he needed to know what had happened to the brat, he would have taken the psychopath up on his offer. The billionaire tapped a few keys on his keyboard, pulling up another window on the holographic screen.

A video feed from the cameras five floors below flickered to life. Fleming watched it idly, wondering where the brat had gotten the bear. In fact, he had no idea why he was even still watching this feed—it was a video of a surprisingly happy-looking Scales, playing with a beaten-up black teddy bear and laughing at a joke one of the guards (Phipps? Phelps?) had just told him.

The billionaire glowered at the video feed for a few more minutes, before jabbing the close button with more force than was necessary. The video screen collapsed out of sight, leaving a blank silvery ghost of the ARK logo behind.

Enough being sentimental. He needed to work.

- o – o -

When Vince stumbled back into his lair shortly after one that afternoon, he made a vow that he would _never_ agree to help Raia with anything. She was a great cook, and breakfast had been a welcome change of pace; unfortunately, the only thing he wanted to do now was drown himself in a tub of hot water. Everything hurt beyond all belief, and he had rope burns on his palms from where the cable had cut through the gloves he'd worn.

Unfortunately, drowning himself was out of the question. His partner was sitting at the command center, nursing a mug of fresh coffee. Orwell was tapping on the keys idly, not really seeming to be doing anything. (Vince couldn't fathom what she was doing there—wasn't she supposed to be finding a new avenue of attack, or something?)

"Hey Orwell," Vince said, slouching over to the cluttered table. He slumped down in a chair, wondering how long it would take the blogger to leave. He didn't remember the last time he'd pulled a muscle in his back, but was pretty sure that this wasn't the first time he'd done so. Playing super hero was going to hurt for a few months…

"Hello Vince," Orwell replied, still distracted by something on her laptop's screen. The glow illuminated her face with a greenish-blue glow—if Vince's self-preservation instinct had been a little weaker, he would have called her a lich. (Or was that undead? Whatever. She looked like the walking corpse from the game that all of the Marines he'd met in the Middle East were playing.)

"What's up?" Vince asked, resting his chin on his hands. Orwell shrugged one shoulder and took another sip of coffee. He sighed. "Max has some weird friends," the vigilante said, wondering if that would get his partner's attention.

"Max has a lot of weird friends."

Vince sighed. "How about streakers? Who are apparently magicians as well, and can piss him off?"

"You don't know much about Max, do you?" Orwell asked, finally looking up. Vince gawked at her, wondering just how Orwell knew so much about the magician. Maybe they were related or something…

"I'll take that as a no," the blogger muttered into her mug of coffee.

Vince stared at his partner for a few minutes, before standing up. "I'm going to go drown myself in the bathtub," he said. "Disturb me at your own peril."

"Goodbye, Vince."

The vigilante smiled and stalked towards the bathroom. He was about to close the door when Orwell spoke up again.

"Vince, do you know anyone by the name of Deveraux?"

Vince groaned. It was one of _those_ days…

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Want to know why Deveraux is a shape shifting streaker? Drop a line and let me know!


	8. Groundwork

Hey! It's a new chapter! Dominic remembers faces really well...

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter Eight: Groundwork

Vince didn't know which part was worse: The fact that magic was real (and possible to do), or that he'd been forced into some sort of magic-based contest between Max and his nutcase friend. He groaned and flopped back on his bed, wishing he hadn't reconsidered drowning himself in the bathtub… Wait. That was a bad idea. Deveraux would probably just resurrect him and then pout for an hour.

The vigilante had known the pseudo-Frenchman for less than two days. In the less than forty-eight hours he'd known Deveraux, he already felt the desire to kill the bastard. The introduction had been…odd to say the least. Then there was the odd gap in his memory between him barging into Max's trailer and Deveraux's introduction that reminded him of the blackout he'd experienced after drinking three shots of the snake wine Max had given him.

The last time he'd had a blackout, Dana had nearly killed him. (All things considered, though, getting drunk hadn't been the best idea at the time. She'd thrown a book at his head.)

Now, though, he would have taken the book-throwing incident over the contest he'd been roped into. From what he could patch together from Max and Deveraux's conversation, they'd been having the same argument for centuries as to who was the better magician. (Vince was pretty sure the two of them were pulling his leg about being immortal. Even taking the fact that magic was real into account, there was no way anyone could become immortal. They'd go crazy…that _could_ explain Fleming, come to think of it…)

"Vince."

The former cop pulled his tatty pillow over his face and wondered how long it would take to asphyxiate himself.

"Don't ignore me Vince, this is important." Vince could picture Orwell glaring up at him, arms crossed over her chest and one foot tapping impatiently on the ground.

"I don't care," Vince replied, voice muffled by the pillow. "I can ignore you if I want to." How much power would it take to convince himself everything that had happened was just a dream? Hell, while he was on that track, he could dream that none of the events that had led to him getting "killed" on live television by ARK troops had never happened. Of course, he'd probably be working for ARK now, but every silver lining had a cloud.

"Vince, you're pouting. Now get up," Orwell said, tone much sterner than before. "There's something you _need_ to see."

"And it can't wait why?" Vince grumbled, pulling the pillow off his face. The pen that Orwell threw at him was a clear signal that it was time to get up. The vigilante sighed unhappily and slid off the bed, landing on the cold cement floor in a crouch.

He hissed unhappily as his feet came in contact with the cold cement, and made another mental note to get a rug or something into the lair before Christmas. He didn't need his feet freezing.

His partner had a cup of coffee waiting for him when he sat down at the command center, in a sort-of apology for dragging him out of bed. The vigilante smiled gratefully and took the mug, resting his chin on one hand as he sipped the piping hot brew. Orwell smiled back and dropped the newspaper on the table in front of him.

It was a miracle Vince didn't choke.

The _Herald_'s headline stared up at him. Today, it was raving about a gala Peter Fleming was hosting in a few days. It was, according to rumor, a cross between a charity ball and a rehash of the casino party that Dice had blown up. The only thing that wasn't rumor or hearsay was the news about security. It was going to be tightened significantly—facial recognition was going to be a big part of security this time around, to make sure that no one got in who wasn't supposed to be there.

"Are you gate-crashing this thing?" Vince asked, staring at the headline before looking up at his partner.

"Don't have to," Orwell replied, looking smug. "Anne Orlando has an invitation." Orlando… Wasn't that one of Orwell's aliases for the food blog she'd found time to write or something? Huh. Whatever.

"Okay," Vince replied, staring at his mug of coffee warily, before taking a cautious sip. It tasted a bit burnt again. "Why are you telling me?" he asked, spitting the coffee back into his mug with a grimace.

Orwell sighed and shot him a disgusted look. The blogger opened the paper to the next section of the article and pointed to a publicity photograph. (Vince thought it was one of the photos that had been put out by ARK's PR division a few days ago.)

"I'm telling you," she said, "Because he's practically taunting the Cape with this. Scales is appearing, in public, for the first time since…whatever it was that happened, happened."

Vince choked on a mouthful of coffee and began coughing again. At this rate, he wasn't going to be able to drink any of it, burnt or not.

"Lemme guess," he said, setting his mug down. "_We're_ gate crashing."

"Yep. Get a tux, Vince."

"This is a very bad idea…"

- o -

Philips sat on a hard plastic chair on the observation deck, doing another crossword. Doctor Winston's granddaughter had come in half an hour ago with a therapy dog. So far, everything seemed to be going well. In Philips' opinion, the only redeeming feature of the ugly mutt was that Nicky seemed to like it.

Why the brat would like an animal that could take his arm off with one bite, Philips couldn't fathom. The security guard groaned and slouched in his chair. It wasn't even noon yet, and he already had a headache. His crossword wasn't helping matters any.

The security guard looked down at the spider trap and grinned. Dominic was really loosening up, all things considered. He was currently sitting on the floor, laughing as Chance—the Pit Bull-Golden Retriever mix—licked his face. The note book next to Eliza Winston told Philips that Dominic was being (dare he think it) open about… Something. Maybe the dog wasn't all bad.

"Philips!"

Philips looked up as someone hissed his name. Jacobs was standing in the doorway that led to the monitor room, looking nervous. The older man sighed and got up, tucking his book of crosswords under one arm as he walked over to the other security guard.

Jacobs was holding a copy of today's _Palm City Herald_. Judging by how antsy he was, and the fact that he didn't want to hold this conversation on the observation deck, told Philips that today's headline was something _very_ bad.

"What's up, Tom?" he asked, shutting the door behind him. Hopefully it would muffle any explosions or screaming that he had to do.

Jacobs handed over the paper, which was folded back to show the second section of the article. The article, which Philips had glanced that on his way out of the apartment that morning, was about a gala Fleming was hosting. The second section made Philips see red.

"I really shouldn't say this," he hissed under his breath, "But is Fleming out of his fucking _mind_? Does he _want_ the gang war to come right to his front stoop?"

Jacobs nodded. "You haven't read your e-mail yet, have you?" he asked. Philips glowered at the younger security guard, who grinned nervously. "Everyone in the project's security team is being seconded to Mr. Fleming's security detail for the evening. Even if you've got other plans," he added, seeing Philips' dark expression.

"And I was looking forward to the horror marathon on SyFy," Philips grumbled under his breath. "Just great."

"Oh yeah. Thank god the boss didn't invite Orwell to this thing."

Philips scowled at Jacobs, who blanched. "You just had to tempt fate, didn't you?" he muttered under his breath, stalking back onto the observation deck. He shut the door behind him with a little more force than was necessary.

The mutt began barking again.

Fifteen minutes after Philips heard the latest breaking news, Doctor Winston's granddaughter came up to the observation deck, Chance trailing behind her. The dog barked at him, and Philips jerked his hand out of the way just in time to avoid getting an impromptu bath from the mutt.

Eliza laughed. "That's just Chance's way of saying hello," she smiled. Philips glowered at her, crossing his arms.

"Sorry," Eliza said, blushing. "Not everyone likes dogs, I guess." She shrugged. Philips nodded, keeping an eye on Chance just in case the mutt decided to jump on him or something. A look down in the pit showed that Dominic was curled up underneath the bed.

(Hell. Who would have guessed that he liked dogs so much?)

"So, what'd you find out?" Philips asked, breaking the awkward silence that threatened to stretch out between Eliza and himself until she decided to leave. Eliza looked at her notes and grinned, shrugging her shoulders.

"Well," the young woman said, "He really likes dogs. Apparently his daddy—whoever that guy is—had a couple of pit bulls. Dominic also likes elephants, knows how to cook, and he really hates the circus." Eliza stared at her notes, looking perplexed. "What kind of little kid hates the circus that much?"

"The circus, huh?" Philips said absently, staring back down at the pit. Doctor Winston was trying to coax Nicky out from underneath the bed with the black teddy bear and a piece of candy. So far, it wasn't working.

"Yeah. Weird, huh?" Eliza gave him another blinding, somewhat flirtatious smile and left, Chance in tow.

Philips stared down at the pit, tilting his chair back on two legs as he thought. So it was the circus, then… Huh. Go figure.

- o -

Dana Faraday stared at the letter in her hands, trying to comprehend exactly what she was holding. It looked like an invitation to a party. Being hosted by Peter Fleming, no less… Did he realize that she hated his guts? Or that she wanted nothing more than to kill him right now? She'd read the article in the paper that morning, concerning the party that she was apparently being invited to.

Before his mysterious de-aging, Scales had been her client. She hadn't had the chance to meet with him before the incident, due to the fact that ARK had run interference for nearly a week. If she had cared a little more for her client, she would have argued the fact a bit more.

Well, at least she had a chance to meet him now. What was the Cape going to think about this…?

The Cape. Oh, there was a conundrum and a half. According to the conversation she'd had with him over a month ago while they were hiding in his friend-of-a-friend's shop, Vince was still alive. As to why Vince hadn't contacted her yet, Dana didn't know.

Maybe he thought the bad guys were watching the apartment or something… No. everyone thought Vince was dead, so that wasn't it. And, according to the cameras she'd found in her apartment (Orwell's search had made her wonder about some things, recently), the mysterious blogger was the only one wiretapping her place. She'd placed pink duct tape over all of the lenses.

Well, she'd ask the Cape about Vince the next time he came around to talk to Trip. (Although when that would be, given the gang war currently raging around the city, Dana didn't know.) Now, though, she had to figure out what she was going to do about the invitation she had received.

Fifteen minutes later, Dana was hanging up the phone. According to the person on the other end of the line—someone from ARK Corporation's Public Relations team—she wasn't being asked to contribute to the charity. Peter Fleming needed another independent witness to testify that he wasn't abusing the miniaturized version of his former enemy. Orwell Is Watching had, somehow, managed to dig up evidence (somehow, although given that it was Orwell…) that the corporation hadn't exactly been truthful about their treatment of Dominic Raoul, after he had been turned into a child.

Now she was heading to a gala, being hosted by Peter Fleming. This was just…wonderful. Dana scowled darkly at the phone in her hands, wondering how hard it would be to immolate someone just by looking at them.

This was going to be interesting…

- o -

Dominic had never been to an actual party—of any kind—before. He had never really been included in the small celebrations the circus had hosted over his ten years there either. The closest he had come was when one of the men in the Flying Squadron had invited him to a wake (the man who had invited him disappeared shortly after, although that was explainable), and had taught him how to drink shots of vodka.

The headache, the ten-year-old decided as he tried not to squirm too much as the tailor measured him for a suit—his _own_ suit!—wasn't worth it. Drinking wasn't very fun… If it weren't for the fact that McClintock was always mean and abusive, the child would have guessed that the headaches were the reason his "foster father" was so grouchy and temperamental.

He looked over his shoulder at the man with the tape measure and chewed on his lower lip nervously. Adults weren't very nice, most of the time, and this man had yet to smile for any reason. Maybe it was because he didn't seem like the kind of person who worked with nippers…

Dominic wished Uncle Jacob—one of the security guards who worked at ARK, for the time-travel project—was at the tailor shop with him. The shop was really scary, and big. The guard who was with him and Mr. Fleming right now wasn't very nice.

He could understand that, though: His older self had hurt Captain Reese pretty badly, because the large man was still wearing a neck brace. He shivered and received a light tap on the back of his head from Mister Zhao, the tailor, in rebuke.

A few minutes later, Zhao had finished and was ushering him off the stool. Mr. Fleming spoke to Zhao in Chinese—it wasn't the dialect he knew, from when the bull man was still with the circus. Whatever it was, it was really good, because Fleming smiled down at him.

Dominic smiled back, and was relieved when Mr. Fleming didn't even raise an eyebrow. The todger had never let him… Well, that didn't actually matter now, because he wasn't anywhere near him anymore. Mr. Fleming led him back out of the shop, holding his hand when they came in view of the reporters who always seemed to follow the billionaire around. Even if it was just for the publicity shots, it was a nice gesture. (Daddy had always held his hand when they took walks around Sycamore Boulevard.)

Hopefully his new suit would be finished by tomorrow evening, when the party was. He'd never had absolutely new clothes that someone had made only for him. It was…nice.

- o -

Jacob Philips was pretty sure he was in hell. There were so many things he could be doing on a Saturday night—like spending time with his girlfriend, alternating between their bedroom and the horror marathon that was playing on SyFy—that didn't include working. According to Sawyer (who was now officially the Chief of Police, the poor man), everyone in the project had to be on hand to answer questions or deflect them. Oh, and they were also supposed to keep the little monster from attacking anyone.

The security officer paced around the ballroom, keeping one eye on his charge and the other on the guests—he really didn't want to deal with the headache of actually having to do work tonight. He didn't want the kid to attack any of the guests, disturbing what was otherwise a peaceful night.

He spotted Dominic walking around the room with Fleming, sticking close to the billionaire's side. Philips smiled a bit, marveling at the extreme differences between the child Dominic was now, and the smuggler he had (would?) grow up to be. This Dominic Raoul was nervous around large crowds and only seemed to attack if he felt threatened—which was less and less, now that he'd settled down. (His nose had finally healed, although it was a bit crooked.)

Philips sighed and went back to his rounds. He could clock off shift in less than two hours, when the next shift on the time travel project came on duty. (At least Fleming was letting them work in shifts, rather than making everyone stay on duty for the duration of the gala.)

The security officer paused when he saw a lost-looking Dana Faraday sitting in a secluded corner of the ballroom. She was friendly with Kia, wasn't she? He smiled and walked over.

- o -

Dominic had a special loathing for crowds, if he had to be perfectly honest with himself. They reminded him too much of the cage during shows, wishing that someone would realize what was going on. Even someone telling McClintock that he was an arse would have been nice…

_Well_, he reconsidered, _maybe not_. The tosser would have blamed him for it, and given him a good clout about the ears for his troubles. Not everything ended well, after all. He jumped slightly when Mr. Flmeing placed a hand on his shoulder. The man had a small smile on his face, but the wicked-looking gleam in his eye told a different story.

"There's someone I'd like to introduce you to, Dominic," the billionaire said quietly. Dominic shivered at the gleam in the man's eye—it was the look McClintock always got when he was about to start lying to social workers who came through the circus to talk to the nippers. At least he got something to eat when they came through…

"Peak," Dominic replied, hoping he sounded more cheerful than he felt. He didn't know Fleming very well (or the man's motivations for anything that had happened in the last month), but he understood what having a lot of money meant. People with money could do whatever they wanted, and the people who didn't have as much looked the other way…

The billionaire led him over to a small knot of people sitting around a low table, chatting and sipping their drinks as they took a break from the gambling. Whatever they were talking about, it sounded boring. Adults were either boring or thick, in Dominic's opinion.

The ten-year-old froze when his roving gaze landed on the tall, black-haired lady in a blue dress. The sinking feeling that he'd had since the party began solidified into a cold ball of _fear_ in his gut. Why couldn't _she_ have disappeared too?

"Mr. Fleming!" she said, looking up from her conversation. Fleming smiled back, kissing the hand that she'd held out. "How nice to see you and…" She trailed off upon spotting Dominic.

"Judge Preston," Mr. Fleming said, "This is Dominic Raoul." The look on his face was clearly telling her to keep quiet about…whatever it was his older self had done. Maybe he was married to her or something.

Dominic grimaced openly at the thought and proceeded to do his best to scrub the image from his brain. For one thing, Fleming had called her Preston, and for another, the witch didn't recognize him—not even the barest flicker.

He drew himself back to reality as Preston laughed and smiled flirtatiously at Fleming. It took all of the child's self control not to gag. And really, he wished she'd stop laughing. The last time he'd heard that…

Why was Fleming introducing them anyways? He really hoped his older self and her hadn't been friends—somehow, he didn't think the smuggler (who'd embraced the hated moniker, if the news was to be believed), would let go of a grudge so easily.

Well, maybe he was looking for some angle. After all, the only thing ARK's CEO really knew about him was that a man named McClintock had abused him. No one knew about his much loathed social worker.

"Say hello, Dominic," Fleming instructed gently, pushing the reluctant boy forward.

"Hello," Dominic muttered sullenly. _Preston was probably still ruining people's lives_, he thought with a mental scowl. At least she hadn't recognized him yet. Just one more bit of paperwork to be forgotten…

The judge smiled and leaned over so she was closer to eye-level with Dominic.

"_Hello sweetie,_" _she said._

_Dominic stared at the floor in the hallway, ignoring the tall brunette lady. Maybe if he didn't react, she'd forget about him, and he'd be able to sneak out. No one would miss him here—they had too many truants to deal with. He really wanted to go home—Daddy was making lasagna tonight, and had promised to teach him how… Why hadn't Sergeant Faraday just left them alone?_

"_Sweetie? Are you okay, sweetie?"_

"_Tip top," Dominic responded dully, staring at the floor. The linoleum was yellow with age and starting to peel away from the cement floor underneath. His shoes were bright blue and green against it; new looking, shiny. McClintock was going to burn them too._

_A strong hand gripped his chin, forcing the ten-year-old out of his thoughts. Mrs. Preston was looking down at him, a concerned look on her face._

"_Sweetie, could you—"_

"_Me name is Dominic!"he snapped angrily. "An' I don' like bein' patronized!"_

_Preston stared at him for a few minutes. Clearly, she wasn't used to having children snap at her. Well, Dominic was different, and he _hated_ patronizing nicknames. He also _hated_ people who never listened to him—like Sergeant Faraday and Mrs. Preston. _

"_Alright honey," Mrs. Preston said with a smile. "Dominic it is." If she expected a grateful response from her young charge, she didn't get one. "Are you ready to go home, Dominic?"_

"_McClin'ock ain' 'ome," the ten-year-old muttered sullenly under his breath as he stood up. He ignored the hand Mrs. Preston offered him and shoved his hands into his trouser pockets. There was a napkin in one, left over from when daddy had taken him out for ice cream two hours ago…_

"_Oh honey," Preston said sadly, placing her hand on his shoulder. "That man you were living with kidnapped you. He's a very bad man, and—"_

"_Don' care," Dominic grumbled, squinting as the bright afternoon light hit his eyes. When his vision cleared, he saw Sergeant Faraday and Vince junior at the foot of the stairs. Dominic's heart rose—maybe Sergeant Faraday was a foster parent, or had reconsidered…_

_His heart fell just as quickly, when he saw Vince junior holding a familiar backpack. If McClintock got that, he'd have to watch the tosser burn his things. Best he didn't take it, then. (Come to think of it, that would probably make the berk dragging him back to McClintock happy.)_

_Vince junior walked over, holding the backpack in his arms with some difficulty. Dominic could see why—it had been badly packed, as though the packer was in a hurry. His favorite book was peeking out of the top, looking forlorn and lonely. The dog-eared pages had been unfolded by someone, and the bookmarks were missing._

_Dominic sighed sadly and looked at Vince junior. The seven-year-old was staring openly at him, no doubt entranced by the green scales that had given the older boy his moniker of "Scales". Well, at least he didn't have to fake being mad now._

_The ten-year-old curled his hand into a fist as the younger boy held out the blue backpack, a gap-toothed grin on his tanned face. _

"_Go 'way," Dominic snarled under his breath, "an' take tha' shite wiv you!" _

_Vince junior stared at him, wide blue eyes filling with tears. Dominic couldn't bring himself to care. "But…but dad said you wanted your things back…" Vince junior was beginning to cry now, looking like his little world had just shattered. Obviously he wasn't used to dealing with other children who didn't like him._

_Dominic raised his hand, clenching it into a fist like he'd seen McClintock do all too many times. "I don' wan' tha' shite!" he snarled, swinging his fist wide. Vince junior jumped back, clutching the backpack to his chest. He was saved from further attacks by the intervention of his cozzer father._

"_Vince," Sergeant Faraday said reproachfully. "What have I said about fighting?" He smiled down at his son, a warm smile that people reserved for their kids and loved ones. The smile faded into a concerned frown when he saw the backpack still clutched in his son's arms. "Vince, haven't you given Dominic his things?"_

_Dominic scowled at the cozzer. "I don' wan' none o' tha' shite," he snapped, forming his face into a disgusted mask. _

_Mrs. Preston sighed loudly, drawing Sergeant Faraday's attention. She tapped her watch, eyebrows raised. The police officer sighed, shrugging._

"_I guess he didn't want his things, then," Vince junior muttered under his breath, walking away with his father._

_That was the last Dominic saw of the Faradays as Mrs. Preston bundled him into the back of her car. He twisted around in the seat so he could stare out the back window, watching Sycamore Boulevard disappear as they rounded a corner… Back to the Trolley Park Fairgrounds and his _beloved_ foster father._

_He wished he was going back to the brownstone, but knew it was empty. The cozzers had raided daddy's home an hour ago, claiming that daddy had kidnapped Dominic. He'd been taken to the police station, and Dominic had been shunted into social services._

_All too soon, they were at the fairgrounds. Mr. Frederickson was waiting at the gates with a sober McClintock. They looked nervous—considering that Frederickson knew exactly what McClintock did, and condoned it (quietly), they had reason to be._

_Mrs. Preston walked over to them, smile wavering slightly as Frederickson left for the back lot or the cookhouse. Dominic trailed behind, dragging his feet in an attempt to draw the eventual confrontation out as long as possible. The longer Preston kept McClintock occupied, the better the chance he had of being able to sleep in the trailer._

"'_Ello, lad," McClintock said, a sick smile on his face. Dominic flinched as McClintock hugged him, recoiling at the first opportunity. McClintock smelled like Jack Daniel's again, stronger this time. How drunk _was_ he? And _why_ didn't Preston notice?_

"_Hello Mr. McClintock," Mrs. Preston said, smiling at the interaction between foster father and son. "I'm so glad to see a happy ending," she added, watching Dominic sit on the fence encircling the fairground. She leaned closer, whispering. "Are those scales, uh…?" _

_McClintock nodded at the unheard question. "Poor mite ain't go' a chance in th' real world, wiv skin like tha'," he whispered, a sad look on his face. "Anyone could take advantage o' me son..." _

_Mrs. Preston nodded, and then giggled as McClintock kissed her hand. _

"_Per'aps you'd like t' come f'r a show la'er tonight?" McClintock asked, keeping a light grip on the social worker's hand. "Th' boy ain' gonna be in 'is act t'night… Wot wiv th' kidnapping, an' all," he added, seeing Preston's curious look._

"_That sounds lovely," Mrs. Preston said, smiling at him in what she apparently thought was a flirtatious manner. How McClintock managed to charm so many women, Dominic didn't know. It was…_disgusting_._

_As soon as Preston's car had disappeared back towards the city proper, McClintock rounded on Dominic._

"_Di' you tell tha' broad anyt'ing?" he roared, grabbing Dominic by his shirt. Dominic shook his head, eyes wide in fear. McClintock smacked him a few times, repeating the question with each blow._

_Dominic's ears were ringing by the time McClintock stopped. After the drunk had left, Dominic stumbled to his feet, clutching his ear. The sun was setting on the horizon, and…_

"Dominic?"

The ten-year-old looked up as someone shook his shoulder. It was Fleming, with a concerned look on his face. Preston was also staring at him, the barest flicker of recognition in her eyes. Dominic grinned maliciously.

"I remember you," he snarled under his breath.

- o -

Philips had been enjoying a fairly polite conversation with Mrs. Faraday when the screaming started. He prayed it wasn't his young charge, and knew it was. He stood up and pulled the tazer off his belt, shooting Dana an apologetic look.

"I got work," he grumbled, and stalked off to the knot of people. Dominic had attacked Judge Preston. Just great.

According to the judge, he'd broken her knee. Philips smelled at least fifteen hours of overtime for everyone on shift tonight. The tazer came in handy, and the ten-year-old went down like a sack of bricks. What a way to end the evening, huh?

He caught sight of a familiar blond and groaned. Orwell had gate-crashed the party. Again.

Just great.

- o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Think Fleming should have thought harder before letting li'l Scales out in public? Drop a line and let me know!


	9. Necromancer

Hey, it's a new chapter! And Deveraux is being crazy! What's not to love...?

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter Nine: Necromancer

Vince could feel Deveraux's eyes on the back of his neck as he practiced with the cloak. There was something disturbing about the man, but he couldn't quite place his finger on it. (Well, there was the apparent immortality and magic, of course, but that wasn't the point.) Whatever it was, the attention was making his skin crawl. The vigilante shrugged his shoulders uncomfortably and snapped the edge of the cloak at another manikin, knocking the head off. Even decapitating helpless manikins wasn't helping…

He would have continued decapitating them, had it not been for the clapping coming from where Deveraux had seated himself almost an hour ago. Vince groaned and wondered how long it would take to beat the magician to death, before discarding it as a bad idea. (Damn it, why did he have to be immortal?) The former police officer turned to face the man, one eyebrow raised.

"_What?_" Vince snapped in exasperation. He was at least grateful that the vaguely Middle Eastern man was wearing clothes this time. He didn't need to add mental scarring to his list of grievances.

"You have beautiful form, my dear," Deveraux drawled, stretching like some feral cat. "But you are a bit slow, and the edge drags down. Try snapping the trailing edge higher next time. That should take care of the extra weight." He smiled as he took another sip of whatever it was he was drinking from a Styrofoam mug. Vince was fairly sure the man was drinking coffee, but given Deveraux's opinion of the drink, he doubted it.

"Right. Thanks…" Vince replied warily. As he understood it, the contest between Deveraux and Max was to see who the better magician was. Somehow, this involved Max training an apprentice and Deveraux doing…something. So, why was Deveraux giving him any help?

"Because it's been centuries since I've had a good contest," Deveraux replied silkily as he stood and stretched in one smooth motion. "And, as I seem to have misplaced my champion, you'll be fighting my proxy."

Vince groaned something obscene under his breath. (Deveraux had been involved in the incident at Owl Island, hadn't he?) And, knowing Deveraux's sense of humor, he'd probably end up fighting Ruvi. Or Orwell, if the man were feeling particularly crazy. For that matter, how did—

"How did I know what you were thinking?" Deveraux smirked, completing Vince's thought for him. The tan man tapped one temple with a long finger and smiled. "Magic, dear boy. Magic."

Vince sighed, knowing that would be the only answer he would get from the man. "Who's your proxy?" he asked, shelving another idea for killing the magician. The vigilante wasn't sure he really wanted to know the answer, but being prepared was better than nothing at all.

"Theoretically," Deveraux smiled, "my nth-times great-grandson. But considering how many pawns that boy has…"

Now the former police officer was _sure_ he didn't want to know who the proxy was.

"Well," Deveraux said with a shrug as he turned to leave, "I'm sure the two of you will have fun. Fleming does look so much like Sir Gregory, after all…" He trailed off, a wistful looking smile on his face that somewhat disturbed Vince, before the news hit him. The magician smirked as the vigilante's complexion turned bone white.

"Yes," the magician said happily, reading Vince's thoughts. "I'm so looking forward to seeing how you and he solve the contest this time. It'll be fun!"

Deveraux was insane.

- o -

Dominic sat on the edge of the bed in the spider trap, staring at the floor. While he knew he'd done something incredibly stupid, he couldn't really feel guilty about it. Preston had gotten what was coming to her, after all. Unfortunately, he'd gotten Uncle Jacob in trouble with Mr. Fleming and Mr. Sawyer. Uncle Jacob, as a result, wasn't very happy with him.

The ten-year-old wondered when he'd begun to care about what other people felt; after all, McClintock had taken great pains to beat any shred of empathy out of him over the years. He hadn't felt sympathy for anyone since, well… Since daddy had gotten arrested. McClintock wouldn't have been happy with how soft he was getting.

He sighed, wondering how long it would take for someone to send him back to the cell in the sub-basement, or for Mr. Fleming to get rid of him. It was inevitable—he'd attacked a friend of Mr. Fleming's, and now the press was baying for blood. (Probably his, considering how little the press had liked his older self, although that tit kind of deserved the negative press. How could anyone be _that_ stupid _or_ gullible?)

Philips was prowling around on the observation deck, shooting mutinous glares at anyone who got in his way. Dominic tracked the man with a wary gaze, wondering if the man was going to snap and start beating him for ruining his leave. Again. (Uncle Jacob and everyone else who'd been on shift when he'd attacked Judge Preston was pulling double shifts for the rest of the week as punishment.)

The child flopped back on the mattress, hands folded over his stomach. He was hungry again, but didn't want to say anything. Pushing his luck wasn't something he wanted to do at this point. Not when Uncle Jacob was mad at him and Doctor Winston wasn't around, anyways.

- o -

Philips prowled around the observation deck, shooting mutinous glares down at his young charge every so often. No matter how sorry he felt for the little brat, he wasn't happy about the consequences of last night's antics. It wasn't _his_ fault the little monster had attacked Judge Preston last night, but he and everyone else who'd been on duty was getting reamed for it. At least the rest of the team was as miserable as he was, although it probably didn't bode well for the miniature whose security they were looking after.

Hell, even Kia wasn't happy with the double shifts he was stuck on for the rest of the week. At least she was mad at ARK this time, and sympathetic towards him. _Well_, Philips thought with a grimace, _something good had to come out of the whole situation_.

The evil little child who'd caused his current problems was sitting on the bed down in his room, not really doing much of anything. Ever since he'd been dragged up here following his antics at the party, the miniature had been practically catatonic.

Philips wasn't going to complain, all things considered. The near-catatonia meant he didn't actually have to do anything that would result in paperwork beyond his usual end-of-shift papers. As it was, the only thing he had to do at the moment was make sure the brat didn't slip into a coma or something—Doctor Winston would have been doing that, but he had managed to score a day off. Somehow. Lucky bastard.

If anything happened to the brat that wasn't supposed to, he had to press the medical call button to get someone up to the project's level as soon as possible. Beyond that, he didn't have to do anything. Still, he was a little nervous about…something. He couldn't exactly place his finger on it, and—

His radio crackled to life, startling the moody security guard out of his thoughts.

"_Philips, you got a minute?"_

It was Jacobs. The kid, who was becoming less of an annoying puppy every day, was downstairs doing damage control as best as possible. This didn't sound like it was related to the press, however. The security officer sounded beyond worried—it was the tone most security officers for ARK got when representatives from the Public Defender's office came by. (Or when some jerk in a cave somewhere got ahold of the number for ARK's bank account and decided it would be funny to order six hundred pizzas. Why anyone would do that, Philips didn't know.)

"Yeah, I got a minute," he replied, shooting a look at the brat. Dominic was laying on the mattress now, legs dangling over the edge.

"_Oh thank god. There's some guy down here who swears he's related to the little demon. And I can't get rid of him."_ There was a note of desperation in the younger man's voice that worried Philips.

Philips headed for the monitor room, hoping he could get video feed from the lobby where Jacobs was stationed at the moment. He did, and stared at the man. From what little information they'd managed to pull out of the brat, and from some vague recollections from a very pissed-off Judge Preston, McClintock was a tall blonde man with a goatee. This guy…looked nothing like that.

He chewed on his thumb as he studied the grainy image. "You check his story out already?" Philips asked, sending a message to Sawyer. Hopefully the man wasn't in a meeting with Fleming when he got the message—Philips would prefer to keep the CEO out of this for as long as possible.

The older security officer grinned at the string of expletives from Jacobs, and took that as a yes.

"_Oh yeah. I checked his story out, all right. Five times."_ Judging by Jacobs' tone, he wasn't very happy with what he'd found…or hadn't. _"His identification is great, but there's something…weird…about the guy. I sent a call to Sawyer. What should I do?"_

Philips sighed and wondered if committing suicide would get him out of his job at ARK Corporation. Fleming was going to blow a gasket when this guy tried to present his proof of relationship. Every piece of evidence presented was going to be double-checked, every fact dissected and compared to official and unofficial records. In short, it meant another few weeks of overtime.

(Although, the security officer mused, Mr. Fleming could probably resurrect employees who were under contract. He also probably tortured them for trying to escape their contracts. Contracts that also, somehow, included getting framed for Chess's crimes. At least that poor sod Faraday had gotten out before things got really crazy.)

He pressed the call button on his radio. "Send the guy up to Sawyer," he sighed. "Let him deal with this headache. Oh, and Jacobs? Get Mr. Fleming on the line…" The string of expletives had Philips wincing as he held the radio away from his ear. Oh yeah. This was going to end well.

Half an hour later, when Philips had almost managed to brush the incident out of his mind, the elevator dinged. A regal-looking young man with way too many tattoos emerged from the elevator, followed by Sawyer and Fleming. Oh boy. How much force would it take to shatter the windows?

Philips shivered, shrugging his shoulders uncomfortably. There was something…not _right_ about the man accompanying his boss and the CEO. Maybe it was the creepy, far-too-content smile, or the tattoos, or… He shivered again, doing his best to conceal his discomfort as he shook the stranger's hand.

"Officer Philips, I presume?" the man asked, clasping his hands behind his back. He smiled, and Philips noted idly that the man had incredibly sharp canines. The security officer nodded in the affirmative and shuddered as the man, Ilya something-or-other, smiled again.

"A pleasure," Ilya smiled. He turned to Mr. Fleming, who looked quite unconcerned. "Now, about this…project…"

Philips shivered as Ilya left, wondering why he'd heard someone murmur "Gregory". He brushed the feeling aside as best he could.

Why did he have the feeling this was going to end badly?

- o -

Dana paced around her living room, gnawing on her lower lip as she thought. The party last night had been fairly decent, until the miniaturized Dominic Raoul had attacked Judge Preston. (The latest report said that her kneecap had been shattered.) Dana had also finally met Kia's mysterious boyfriend, Jacob Philips. He was a surprisingly genteel person, despite his career with ARK Corporation.

The _Herald_'s current headline was berating Fleming for his decision to bring the miniature Raoul out in public without a leash. All things considered, Dana couldn't exactly blame them. She'd heard quite a bit about the adult Scales during her time in the Public Defender's office, and not all of it was charitable. (Despite this, the dockworkers she'd come in contact with had nothing but good words to say about him. Obviously there was more than one side to the man.)

Dana sighed and flopped down on the couch. She'd somehow managed to finish her paperwork for the week, which left her with nothing to do. Everyone was being advised to stay inside unless it was absolutely necessary, due to the gang war raging outside. According to gossip from the sweet kid who came in to file paperwork for the longshoremen from time to time, the other gang lords were taking offense to Michael Kaczanowiczk and his hold on the docks.

So far, the only building that hadn't been shot up was the apartment building she lived in. It seemed her next door neighbor, Dane Jackson, was the chemist for every major player in the city. None of them wanted to get on his bad side, so they left the apartment building alone. Thankfully, her rent hadn't gone up any.

She sighed as her son came into the living room, looking glum. Ever since Orwell had come through their apartment nearly two months ago, the Cape had been appearing less and less. If she weren't so grateful that the strange adult man had stopped visiting her underage son in the middle of the night (_without_ supervision), she would have been worried. Hopefully his girlfriend was keeping him busy elsewhere. Or maybe they were trying to find Vince…

"Mom?"

Dana looked up at her son, one eyebrow raised in a question. "Yeah sweetie?" she asked, sitting up.

"Why hasn't the Cape come back?"

The public defender sighed. Of _course_ her child would want to know where the disturbing man was when he wasn't at the apartment. She smiled and shrugged. "He's probably off fighting gang lords or something, Trip."

"But…"

It was clear Trip didn't believe her. He had been this stubborn at the age of four, when he asked point blank if Santa Clause was real. Sadly, he had refused to believe her and Vince. It was depressing to see a child that young not believe in Santa. (When she found out that Sergeant Hanson was responsible for that conversation, she'd nearly flown out to Florida to kill him personally.)

"Trip, we're in the middle of a gang war," Dana said, going for the direct approach. "The Cape is probably so busy fighting the bad guys that he doesn't have the energy left to do much else. I'm sorry sweetie. I miss him too…" She sighed, trailing off.

It was true, after all. She did miss the vigilante. Even for his more disturbing traits, he had somehow gotten word to Trip (and her, _after_ the fact) that Vince was still alive. Dana just wished that Vince could contact her—even just once, with a simple "I'm alive, honey". That would have been…wonderful.

"Fine," Trip muttered, slouching out of the room. He was moodier than ever, and his grades at school hadn't improved any. Dana was just thankful he hadn't been suspended again—although he was coming home with black eyes more often than she'd like.

Dana sighed and moved into the kitchen, thinking about making another pot of coffee, just in case the vigilante _did_ stop by. To say she was surprised to find him perched on the kitchen windowsill like some overgrown bat would have been an understatement. She recovered from her shock quickly and smiled at the masked man.

"Would you like some coffee?" she asked.

The Cape grinned, eyes crinkling at the corners. Why did that expression remind her of Vince? Dana shook the feeling away and set about preparing the coffee. She turned to the vigilante when she realized he was still sitting on her windowsill.

"You can go into the living room," she offered gently. "The couch is a lot more comfortable than the windowsill." The vigilante smiled at her.

"Thank you Mrs. Faraday," he rasped, stepping into her kitchen. Up close, he wasn't as tall as she'd imagined him being. That, or he was slouching. Dana frowned in concern as she watched him sway on his feet a little, before he recovered and moved past her into the living room. Maybe he needed sleep more than coffee, Dana thought as she waited for the coffee to brew.

Fifteen minutes later, the public defender brought two mugs of fresh coffee into the living room. Her son was nowhere in sight (hopefully he was asleep, and she could deny any knowledge of this having ever happened), so Dana sat down next to the Cape.

When he didn't respond, Dana looked over in concern. The vigilante's eyes were closed and his head was tilted back against the sofa back. She'd been right. The man needed sleep more than he needed coffee. She sighed and stood up, heading for the hall closet so she could get a blanket. She'd never hear the end of it from Trip if his superhero best friend died of exhaustion; come to think of it, she'd never hear the end of it for not letting him know that that Cape had fallen asleep in their apartment.

Dana returned a minute later with a thick red quilt in her arms. She spread it over the vigilante, smiling as he mumbled something under his breath. This close, he really did remind her of Vince, and… She bit her lip, looking around. She'd read the story of Psyche in college, during an elective she'd taken for unknown reasons. No peeking.

But…if she put the mask back and never said anything, who was going to know? Besides, who was going to know that she'd peeked under his mask?

Dana placed her fingers under the mask and pulled upward.

"Vince?" It came out as more of a squeak. Dana was rather proud of herself for not fainting.

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Is Dana going to beat Vince to death with a coffee mug? Drop a line and let me know!


	10. Networking Can Change Your Life

Hey, it's an update! And look, plot!

Un-beta'ed, as always.

- o – o -

Chapter ten: Networking can change your life

Dana paced around her bedroom, shooting angry looks at the door and, by extension, her husband every so often. Yesterday evening, she'd discovered that, not only was he still alive, but he'd been gallivanting around the city playing superhero. This was almost as bad as the time the Jackals had come to Palm City for a reunion.

At least, she thought with a scowl, Vince hadn't been lying to her or omitting information that it would have been really nice to know. He could have let her know three months ago that he was alive—she wouldn't have taken it too badly… Maybe. The public defender sighed and flopped down on her bed, shooting a look at her alarm clock.

The woman groaned and pulled her pillow over her face. It was three in the morning, and she had to go in to work in four hours. It was too early for this… Hell, it was too early for anything. Dana glowered at the wall, wondering if she could put the evil eye on Vince (who was currently sleeping on her couch) through the wall.

She would kill him later. _After_ she'd had her coffee, and _after_ her beloved husband had explained things to Trip. Now that was a good thought.

- o -

Philips still wasn't sure how he'd gotten a day off, but he was sincerely grateful for it. He'd done quite a bit of thinking the night before, and come to one horrific conclusion: He was growing a conscience.

The security officer groaned in disbelief and rubbed his face with both hands. He really had no idea when it had started to take hold, but it was worrisome all the same. His job with ARK Corporation practically depended on his being a stone-cold asshole who didn't answer to anyone but the boss. Now though… He was starting to question himself, and unfortunately, contracts with ARK didn't really have clauses for employees who wanted to quit. Getting fired, on the other hand…

He gave a strangled scream of frustration and flopped back on the bed. Kia had gone to work an hour ago, leaving him with half a pot of fresh coffee and a reminder to do the laundry. While he normally would have loved a chance to go through Kia's things, it wasn't quite as exciting a thought as normal. And then there was the fact that he was about to do something monumentally _stupid_ with his day off.

Philips pulled a t-shirt on and looked down at the words on it, thinking. Yeah. Not a good idea. He pulled it back off and grabbed one of his remaining plain black t-shirts out of the dresser. Looking presentable was going to go a long way towards what he was planning to do.

After getting dressed, Philips stuffed the paperwork he'd spent half the night working on into a satchel, grabbed a mug of coffee, and left the apartment. Kia had been speaking of Dana Faraday in glowing terms for the last month, and his impression of her from their conversation at the party had been pretty good as well. She was honest, a bit of a pit bull, and willing to fight for justice—which was _exactly_ why he was going to her for this.

As the security officer headed for the bus stop, he pondered his sudden attack of conscience. Yesterday morning, he'd been normal. Nothing had bothered him about the fact that the miniature was still terrified of him, and had a mini-panic attack every time Fleming's name was mentioned. But now… Honestly, it was the brat's fault.

Philips sighed, slouching onto the bus. The driver shot him a glare, which Philips ignored as usual. After three and a half months, the gang war had settled down; ARK Corporation, meanwhile, was still far from popular.

Last night, he'd been about to clock off shift, elated at the idea of having a day off. (Despite the fact that his pay was good, he hated getting up at o-dark-thirty to go to work.) And then the brat had had a nightmare.

- o -

_Philips was quite ready to clock off shift at this point. The miniature had been on his best behavior for the past few hours—hell, he'd been well-behaved since getting tazed at the party—and the quiet was something Philips thought he could get used to. _

_The security officer took one last look around the observation deck to make sure he hadn't left anything behind. His newest book of crosswords was in his backpack, he'd recovered the deck of playing cards from the miniature an hour ago, and… Philips' train of thought ground to a halt as he heard the first whimper._

_He wondered if the universe just hated him personally, or if it was just that kind of day. The man looked into the spider trap (seriously, what the hell else was he supposed to call it?), wondering if Dominic had somehow rolled off the new bed—he'd been taken off medical observation that morning, and the old things had been switched out for normal furniture._

_Nope. Judging by the way he was twisting around, the miniature was having a nightmare again. Philips sighed and buried his face in his hands. Night shift wasn't due up here for another fifteen minutes, and he didn't actually clock off until they got up here._

_Philips sighed and dumped his backpack onto the hard plastic chair against the railing. He could do this, and then get the hell out of dodge. Hopefully Kia would still be awake by the time he got back to their apartment…_

_Dominic was curled up in a ball near the headboard when Philips got down to the pit. The ten-year-old had kicked the blankets onto the floor at some point, and the beaten-up black teddy bear was nowhere to be seen. That was probably what had caused this, Philips thought with a sigh and a shake of his head._

_The security officer picked the blankets up off the ground and pulled them back over the child, who seemed to have settled down. He was unprepared for the miniature sitting upright with a scream. _

_Philips sat down on the bed, instinctively pulling Nicky into his arms. Nothing really came to mind that was soothing, so he just sat there, letting the child cry himself back to sleep._

_After Dominic was back in dreamland with Russkie clutched safely in his arms, Philips left. He sighed. _

"_You're getting soft, old man," Philips muttered under his breath. "You're getting soft."_

- o -

Philips groaned, realizing that his mutterings last night as he'd left work had been entirely too true. He was growing soft, and it was all because of the kid. That was probably why he was being such an idiot today—although he could always stay on the bus until it got to dockside, and he could get drunk. And review the facts of life, as they pertained to his job.

He nixed the idea almost immediately. For one thing, he'd end up in prison at some point—just admitting what he'd done for ARK was enough to get him life without parole, and for another, he was a chatty drunk. (According to Kia he was, anyways.)

The bus stopped in front of Palm City's legal hub, jolting Philips out of his thoughts. He gathered his satchel up and left the bus at a fast clip. The sooner he got this done, the sooner he could tender his resignation. He'd quit ARK and find another job…somewhere.

Philips walked into the main lobby of the legal hub and headed for a side hallway branching off the busy hub of the building. Kia had mentioned that Dana's office was on the first floor, somewhere off one of the hallways that led in and out of the lobby.

As luck would have it, the first office he tried was Faraday's. He took a deep breath and knocked.

Dana Faraday was working on a stack of paperwork when she heard the knock. She was sorely tempted to tell whoever was on the other side to come back later, but decided against it. For all she knew, it was Travis with more paperwork for her. Pissing off the boss wasn't a good idea.

She sighed. "Come in!" she called. The public defender was surprised when, instead of her boss and more cases to slog through, Kia's boyfriend entered her office. He looked uncomfortable, which really wasn't a surprise. The only people who had more potshots taken at them than ARK officers were judges, and the judges had banded together to pay for bodyguards.

"Mrs. Faraday?" Philips asked, wrapping one hand around the strap on his satchel. He knew it was her, but it was better to introduce himself again.

"What's up…Philips, wasn't it?" Dana replied, smiling as she closed the folder she had been working in. "What can I do for you?"

Philips sighed, slouching down in one of the seats crammed into the office. "I need some legal advice," he replied after a few seconds.

"Couldn't you ask Kia?" Dana said. This was entirely too weird. What was Philips doing here? Didn't he have a miniaturized criminal to guard, or something?

"Well…" Philips trailed off uncomfortably. "I need something witnessed, and I don't want Kia to know just yet. She'd probably kill me."

Dana raised an eyebrow, wondering if she was being asked to look at a pre-nup agreement or something. There was someone who'd done that kind of paperwork for the last twenty years just down the hall…

"What do you need witnessed?"

"Can I have a promise that news of this will never leave the room?" Philips asked, pulling the satchel onto his lap. He rested his hands on the smooth canvas, fingers splayed over it. The security officer appeared calmer than he felt at that moment.

"Attorney-client privilege," Dana responded. "If I'm being asked to witness something, or notarize it, then it falls under the purview of attorney-client privilege and I can't speak about it."

"Oh good," Philips said. He pulled a thick manila envelope out of the bag, placing it on Dana's desk. A second envelope, this one brown, was placed next to it. The third one was, in Dana's opinion, a bit excessive. Either he wanted three things witnessed, or he had three copies he needed a witness for. What was he doing?

Dana opened the manila envelope first and pulled out a sheet. The writing on it made her eyebrows disappear into her hairline. _"I, Jacob Winston Philips, do certify that everything in the following documents is true and factual to the best of my knowledge. No deviation has been taken from the true course of events, and I swear before the courts and this witness," _there was a space for someone's name there, _"that everything presented here is as follows. Signed, Jacob Winston Philips, 15 October 2011."_

What had Philips been doing? She pulled out the next sheet, and began to feel sick to her stomach. The next sheet wasn't much better, and by the time she had finished skimming each carefully written page, Dana was sure she was going to throw up.

Philips had been there when Vince had been framed. He'd stapled the mask to her husband's head and helped kill him. The security officer knew Chess's identity, and he'd participated in a number of the psychopath's crimes.

"I'm sorry."

Dana looked up at the whisper she'd half-heard from Philips. The man looked miserable, slumped over in his seat like he'd just been told that his dog was dead or that Christmas had been cancelled. Apparently he'd grown a conscience sometime in the past year, to admit all of this. Dana was half-afraid to look in the two remaining envelopes—if the first one had held evidence exonerating Vince, who knew what the others held?

She sighed. "I need to call Travis and Kia in on this," Dana said. Philips gave no sign of protesting as she lifted the phone to her ear and dialed a number from memory. Kia and Travis arrived at her office in less than five minutes. Kia looked furious and Travis had a speculative look on his face.

Dana handed the two remaining files to her coworkers, and watched with some trepidation as Kia opened the red envelope. It took the Hispanic lawyer less than five minutes to go through the contents of the envelope. By the time she had finished, there were tears in her eyes and a betrayed look on her face.

"Don't say it, Kia," Philips sighed when he saw his girlfriend's face. "I fucked up big time. Do you want me to move out?"

Kia stared at her boyfriend as though he'd grown another head. "I'd love to castrate you right now," she said, holding up the red envelope. "But I think I can work with this." She turned to Dana. "So, what are we doing with this? Listing it as a dying confession?"

"I don't think so," Dana said, looking at Philips. "He's probably not in any danger of that. Yet."

There was no missing the tone Dana was using. Philips was pretty sure he could use it to beat someone with, although he wasn't going to voice that out loud. After all, the only person in the room who didn't look like they were liable to kill him was Travis Hall, but the speculative look on the other man's face wasn't helping any.

Dana grinned evilly at him, and Philips felt a chill running down his spine. This was going to end badly for him…

Twenty minutes later, a rough plan had been hammered out. Travis's friend in the Justice Department was on board with their plan. Unfortunately for Philips, this meant that everyone in the room had to act as though he were seconds from dying—something about the evidence being harder to throw out if it were protected as a dying confession, and Fleming getting forced into forfeiting his rights to the sixth amendment protection. Philips, who had been dating Kia for nearly two years, still had no idea what any of that meant.

Whatever else happened, Philips was glad that he wasn't being forced into protective custody just yet. Somehow, he had the feeling that Travis's friend would lock him at the bottom of a mine shaft and throw away the key.

And, at the very least, Kia hadn't dumped him. The information in the packet she'd read was explosive. She wasn't dumping him, he had been informed, because he had disclosed everything in such accurate detail and she wasn't about to get rid of the only man who's eyes didn't glaze over when she started talking in legalese. (He was still being banished to the couch for the foreseeable future, though. Every silver lining had a cloud.)

Kia, Travis, and Dana accompanied him back to the lobby, discussing potential strategies in low voices. The unholy trio consulted Philips on details in the packets they were browsing through on occasion, apparently wanting to keep as many details as they could straight. If Philips understood what they were saying, they were trying to figure out a strategy should he disappear for some reason.

(He really didn't want to contemplate what they were going to do with a Statement against Interest exception. It sounded bad.)

Philips froze like a deer in the headlights when he saw the five men in the middle of the lobby. He knew them from his rounds with ARK patrol, back before the time travel project. Weren't they enforcers for Li'l Z's gang…?

Oh shit.

The security guard did the first thing he could think of and pulled Kia to the ground. His bellow of "hit the floor!" came a few seconds before the men started firing. Why was Dana's shirt red…?

With that final thought, Philips passed out as a chunk of plaster fell from the ceiling and hit him on the side of the head.

- o -

Dominic wasn't sure why he'd done it. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, after all.

The ten-year-old sighed as he contemplated the key card in his hands. He'd swiped it from Officer Philips the night before. He hadn't even been thinking when he'd done it—it had just happened. Personally, Dominic blamed Aunt Amanda for his ability to pick pocket. She had gotten fed up with how thin he was all the time and taught him how to lift money out of people's pockets so he could buy food. (It hadn't worked out for him, in the end. The only thing of value he'd managed to lift before the todger had broken his wrists was an old watch off of Mister Frederickson, in an attempt to prove that he could steal things without getting caught.)

He shook himself out of his thoughts and swiped the card into another reader. He'd been looking for the stairs for the last hour, trying to make his way down to the ground floor. So far, he'd only found a couple of supply closets filled with boring paperwork.

The eighth door he tried made him grin, though. He'd found the stairwell. Dominic slipped through the door, keeping one eye on the security camera as he closed the door oh so carefully. It wouldn't do for one of the guards on night shift to discover him getting on a walkabout. After shattering that bitch Preston's kneecap, they weren't exactly inclined to be very nice to him.

Dominic flattened himself against the wall as he heard people thundering by in the corridor below. After a few seconds, when it was apparent that no one was coming into the stairwell, he continued down. Who was Doctor Samuel anyways, and why did anyone care if he was dying from blood loss? And who the effin' 'ell was Chess?

"Hello, my little one."

Dominic looked up at the man he'd run into, and felt a thin trickle of icy fear run down his spine. No! It wasn't fair! He was almost home free this time… He bit his lip as he felt tears well up in his eyes. Before they had a chance to start falling, the stranger had produced a handkerchief from somewhere and was wiping the tears away.

Deveraux smiled as the sleep-inducing drug he'd worked into the fabric took hold. He gathered the small child up in his arms and murmured a few words from a long-dead language. The game was moving too slowly for his tastes, and Max was getting insufferably arrogant.

Mortals were stronger than magicians, in ways that Max couldn't even begin to imagine.

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Think Philips is doing something incredibly stupid but noble? Drop a line and let me know!

Many thanks to WtchCool, who provided the majority of the legal advice utilized in this chapter. She did a wonderful job and deserves a round of applause for putting up with my questions.


	11. How My Parents Ruined My Life

Hey, it's a new chapter! Holy crap! Plot devices!

Beta'ed by the wonderful WtchCool.

- o – o -

Chapter Eleven: How My Parents Ruined My Life

Trip was studying for a history test when he heard someone wrapping on his window. The ten-year-old ignored it and turned to another page; no matter how much the rest of his class hated him, the teacher still wanted him to do well. His dad was currently in the dog house with mom, and he wasn't too happy either. After all, it wasn't every day that he…

The ten-year-old groaned and beat his head against the text book as the Cape—his _father_, in _tights_—tapped on the window again. (Why did his dad have to be so _weird_? First he faked his death, and then didn't tell him to keep his window locked while he was still the Cape, and now he was annoyed when Trip kept his window locked. It was, to Trip's mind, a real pain in the butt.)

He rolled off his bed and padded over to the window and unlocked it. He shoved the bottom half up, wincing as it screeched in its frame. His dad was perched on the fire escape, looking extremely worried and relieved at the same time.

"Hey Trip," Vince said lightly, relief tingeing his voice. "Something happened…"

Trip muttered something under his breath that got him a reproachful look from Vince. "Sorry dad," the chastened ten-year-old muttered, mind going over how weird it was that he'd never noticed how similar the Cape was to his dad. "What's up? Mom still has some coffee, I think…" he stepped back so his father could step into the apartment, rather than having to perch on the fire escape like some giant bat where anyone could see him.

"Your mother was shot."

The ten-year-old stared at his father. "Why are you here then? Why aren't you helping mom?"

Vince rubbed his temples wondering, not for the first time, if this was a good idea. "Because she's in the ICU now, and I don't want you to get lost in the system." He sighed, looking as though he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. "Pack a bag; I've got some friends you can crash with for a few days."

Trip raised an eyebrow in disbelief, but complied anyways. He was probably going to be staying at that brunette girl's place or something—it was another thing mom could use to bury dad, given the impending divorce. In any event, he left a note on his computer for Gerry in case the other boy came by later or something. He really didn't want his friend freaking out and doing something stupid.

Fifteen minutes later, Trip was clinging to his father and praying that the man would slow down. The other part of his brain was focused on how totally cool it was that his father had a motorcycle. He had no idea what their destination was, because his dad wasn't heading for one of the residential sections of Palm City. Instead, they were heading for Trolley Park.

(If he thought about it, though, it did make sense. His dad was using a lot of circus tricks, and there was a circus in Trolley Park. Maybe they were the ones who'd taught his dad how to be the Cape…)

- o -

Philips brushed away the paramedic's hands again, swearing under his breath at the man. Yeah, he had a nice gouge in the side of his head, but it wasn't going to do anything. He was fine—all he needed was a band-aid and any news regarding Kia and Dana. The shooting at the public defender's office had everyone up in arms, and he wasn't in any shape to do anything about it.

"Look, I'm fine!" the security officer snapped, getting fed up with the paramedic trying to check his blood pressure. "Fuck off!" The man looked at him and shrugged.

"Suit yourself, man," he said and gathered up his equipment. Philips watched the man run off to another station in the hastily-erected emergency ward that had blocked off most of Chandler Boulevard. The shooting had done a lot of damage, and the bomb squad was getting called in to deal with some suspicious packages that had been placed in the lobby.

Philips sighed, rubbing his temples wearily. His cell phone rang, making him jump. The man swore as he pressed a bit too hard on the cut marring the side of his face, and opened his cell phone.

"Yeah. What's up…? Oh hell. Not again." Philips wondered if it was too late to kill himself (hey, that'd make his paperwork go through faster!), and decided against it. Finding the miniature was beginning to look like a very good idea right now.

Fleming was up in arms, for more than one reason. Someone had murdered his psychiatrist, the miniature had escaped, and the public defender's office had been shot up. Really, what wasn't the billionaire going to be upset about?

The security guard sighed, muttered some vague affirmative, and shut his cell phone with another grumbled curse. Dana had already been taken away in an ambulance, so he didn't need to check up on her at the moment. Travis had gotten away with a single gunshot wound to the shoulder, which was decent enough given the events. Kia was nowhere to be found though, and that worried Philips more than anything.

He stood up and began prowling through the tents in search of his girlfriend. What would have happened if he hadn't chosen today to come down to file that evidence? Hell, what was going to happen when the investigators started questioning people about why they were there? (Either way, he was screwed. He supposed he could always argue that a migraine was making it hard to concentrate on questions…)

"Hey Philips!"

Philips stopped in his tracks and turned around. Jacobs was running towards him, dodging various paramedics and volunteers who'd turned out in droves to help with the injuries. Philips sighed, wondering what was up now.

"Hey man, it's great to see you." Jacobs came to a halt in front of the older man, panting slightly. "Listen, the boss is up in arms about the mini disappearing." Philips raised an eyebrow, as if to ask what else was new. Jacobs grinned ruefully, rubbing the back of his head.

"Alright, I know that," Philips replied, shoving his hands in his pockets. The satchel he had collected before investigators could start pawing through the rubble rested heavily against his thigh. It was an unpleasant reminder of his conscience.

"Yeah. Anyways, we're supposed to start combing the city for this guy," Jacobs said, holding up a photo that had been pulled off a security camera. The man in the picture was tall and had blond hair tied back in a style that looked kind of like the elves from Lord of the Rings. He was smirking up at the camera, a sleeping Dominic in his arms.

"Fuck," Philips said eloquently. If this situation with the time travel thing ever got resolved, he was going to have to be the kid's advocate… Or convince Kia to help him out with that.

"Yeah."

- o -

Deveraux paced around Max's trailer, snarling curses in languages long dead under his breath. The other magician was seated behind his desk, going over plans for another heist and seemingly paying no mind to his irate friend. The younger magician scowled at Max for a few seconds before throwing himself down on one of the overstuffed chairs that had been crammed into the trailer.

"Are you done throwing your tantrum?" Max asked mildly, looking up from his work. There was a small smile on his lips, letting Deveraux know he was teasing. The lighter magician made a rude gesture and Max snorted.

"No," snapped Deveraux after a few seconds. "I am not, as you say, _over my tantrum_. You. Locked. That child. In. A. _Cage!_" With that, Deveraux was up and pacing again, muttering dire portents under his breath. Max leaned back in his chair, chin propped up on one hand.

"And you were the one who wanted to force Fleming into being his proxy," Max said, regarding his competitor with an air of disdain. The two of them had spent far too long around each other to be on the friendliest terms, especially when they started fighting—wildfire and glaciers never got along on the best of days.

Deveraux muttered a Mesopotamian curse under his breath and sat down in the seat he had vacated. The tattoos around his right eye were glowing faintly with barely contained power. Max was not impressed with the lack of control his young compatriot was showing.

"I fail to see what that has to do with anything," Max said mildly, after he translated the curse into English. "And you were the one who brought—"

The magician was cut off when Vince entered Max's trailer with his usual lack of knocking. Deveraux fixed the young vigilante with one of his usual leers, grinning when Vince flushed and shifted uneasily.

"Vincent," Max said, acknowledging his apprentice's arrival. "What do you want?"

"I umm… I need a place for my kid to stay, and umm…"

"Something happened to that cave you live in?" Max surmised. Vince grimaced, his expression saying everything.

"I had to vacate it yesterday. ARK patrol," he added, seeing Max's expression. "Most of the computer stuff got scrambled, and everything I couldn't save was burned, but…" Vince trailed off, a helpless look on his face.

"Fine," Max sighed, a resigned look on his face. "I suppose the trailer you slept in during your first stay will do for both of you." There was a warning note in the magician's voice, one that clearly told Vince he needed to find a new home quickly. Vince quite agreed.

After Vince had left to take his son to the trailer on the other side of the big top, Deveraux turned to Max.

"And now we have a bargaining tool for the contest," Deveraux said simply, winking. He vanished from sight, and Max sighed. The young magician had no sense of decorum, but at least he'd lost the overly theatrical edge of rotten egg-smelling smoke.

This was going to be very interesting…

- o -

Dominic sat against the back wall of the cage, curled up into a tiny ball. He had no idea what was going on, but knew it wasn't anything good. Three hours ago, he'd been making his way to the ground floor of ARK Towers in an escape attempt that had been going decently until the blond man appeared out of nowhere on the first-story landing.

He sighed and wrapped his arms around his legs, praying he didn't start crying. A day ago, he'd have given anything to get out of ARK Towers; now, he'd give anything to go back. The doctors he'd had to visit every day during his stay there hadn't been nice, and the needles they kept sticking into his arms to draw blood hurt a lot, but at least he hadn't been in a cage…

The ten-year-old's shoulders shook as he began crying into his knees. He wished he hadn't been such a rudding tit and had stayed in the spider trap. He'd have given Uncle Jacob his key card back, and maybe he'd have gotten a joking smile in return. Uncle Jacob was going to be in a lot of trouble for what he'd done.

The blonde man who'd kidnapped him from ARK Towers was still in the silver Airstream trailer at the other end of the big top. They were probably talking about something related to him. Dominic wasn't sure he wanted to know—it was probably related to him going back to being on display as a freak.

He swallowed, trying to blink back more tears. His trouser legs were almost soaked around the knees now. The ten-year-old hated himself for being so weak, especially around the carnies that kept shooting looks of utter loathing at him. (Well, all of them except for the blond lady who worked with animals. She just looked sad, which was somehow worse than the looks of hatred from everyone else.)

Dominic looked up when he heard the door of the cage rattling and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. A tall man in a black, hooded cloak was looking down at the lock on the door, a look of annoyance on his face. Judging by the glint of metal in the man's hands, he was trying to pick the lock.

The ten-year-old shrank back, eyes wide in fear. He'd been shoved into the cage by members of the carnival, and this man was probably another one of them. Carnivals had never worked out where he was concerned.

He flinched when the padlock fell away from the door. The man who'd picked the lock was staring at him with a look of concern that seemed oddly out of place. Dominic bit his lip and sniffed back some more tears as the man reached into the cage.

"Come on, kiddo," he coaxed, gesturing for Dominic to come towards him. The ten-year-old shook his head, pressing back against the wood panel behind him. The man would have to drag Dominic out, if he wanted the child out of the cage.

"Dominic, I know you're scared, but come here," the man said again. His tone was gentler this time, and reminded Dominic of Uncle Jacob. Dominic looked out at the big top through one of the barred walls and saw that none of the carnies were around. Tentatively, he crawled forward, encouraged by the man's smile.

"See? That wasn't so hard," the cloaked man said. Dominic shuddered as the man picked him up. "I'm the Cape," the man said, seeing Dominic's terrified expression.

Dominic raised one disbelieving eyebrow and snorted. And now there was some bloke running around who thought he was a comic book character? Peak. As if the day couldn't get any stranger.

"Yeah, I get that a lot," the Cape laughed, seeing Dominic's expression. The man looked around, a worried expression on his face. "Yeah, um… I'm not supposed to be doing this, so let's go." He set Dominic on the ground, keeping hold of one of the boy's hands. Dominic didn't even try to pull away; he'd probably get smacked about the ears for his troubles.

The Cape led him to another trailer outside the big top, pausing only to open the door as quietly as possible. Dominic saw why when he peeked through the door and saw another child curled up on the sofa, sound asleep.

A superhero with a son? Or was the other boy the Cape's sidekick? (He couldn't remember the hero having a sidekick in the comic. He hadn't read any of the recent issues, either from 1983 or 2011 though, so one of them could have cropped up somewhere.)

Dominic wiped his eyes again as the superhero brushed past him towards the end of the trailer and the bedroom. He looked at the couch again, hoping there was a hidey hole between the arm and the wall, like there had been in the todger's trailer.

There wasn't but it didn't matter, because the blond child—the normal, un-freaky one—was waking up. Dominic froze.

- o -

Trip stared up at the ceiling of the trailer he was living in for the time being, blinking sleep out of his eyes. He'd thought he heard his dad coming in, but a quick look around showed no sign of the man. The ten-year-old rolled his eyes, realizing that he had to get used to not having a dad around all the time. Again.

He sat up, rubbing his eyes and yawning. Trip stopped mid-stretch when he saw another boy, probably his age, standing in the middle of the trailer. He had a scared look on his face, like he'd done something wrong and didn't know what to do.

The ten-year-old stood up and approached the other boy. Up close, he looked weird and… Well crap. He was standing next to the ten-year-old Dominic Raoul, who had been (would be?) one of the most wanted criminals in Palm City. So, naturally, he did the only thing he could think of.

"Hi, I'm Trip."

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Are Trip and Dominic going to become friends or try to kill each other? Drop a line and let me know!


	12. Game On

Hey, it's a new chapter! Up a little later than expected, but RL interfered.

Beta'ed by the lovely WtchCool.

- o – o -

Chapter Twelve: Game On

Trip ducked underneath the bleachers in the big top, panting as he tried to catch his breath. How he'd gotten so worn out in the first place, he didn't know. Last night, he'd woken up from a nap in his dad's new hiding place to find himself face-to-face with a pint-sized version of Dominic Raoul. Surprisingly enough, Dominic wasn't actually half-bad.

Correction: He was weird. Dom wasn't the little demon-child like everyone in the press had made him out to be, but he was _weird_. Case in point: Trip couldn't think of any ten-year-old who had a panic attack after being told he could eat with everyone else. It had taken his dad almost half an hour to calm the other boy down. (At least now he understood why his dad had always looked so weird after shift some days, back when the PCPD was still policing Palm City.)

The ten-year-old looked up at the bleachers above him, wondering if Dominic was climbing around them. He was unprepared for his new friend to drop down from the crossbeams, a wide grin on his face.

"Boo!"

Trip jumped, swearing under his breath as he banged his head on the beam above him. He glowered at Dominic, who was laughing into his hands. Trip looked up, wondering how the other boy had managed to hang upside down.

"Got ya!" Dominic laughed, earning himself another glare from Trip. He swung back on the beam he was hanging from, grinning as Trip shot him a look of consternation.

"How are you doing that?" Trip asked, changing the subject away from himself. His head really hurt now. When they got back to playing tag, he was going to make that brat eat dirt…

Dominic shrugged, an odd gesture for someone who was upside down. He reached up to the beam he'd curled his legs around and grabbed hold. Trip watched in fascination as the other ten-year-old performed a series of contortions that would have made most kids their age die. Dominic dropped to the ground, a look of triumph on his face.

"It's easy," Dominic replied. "Getting' up t'ere is the 'ard part."

That was another thing that made Dominic weird: His accent. Trip had trouble deciphering it, and judging by the looks on everyone else's faces, they were having trouble too. He sighed mentally. They were only ten, after all. Dominic would grow out of it. Maybe.

He grinned as Dominic darted past him, yelling that he was it. That brat was going to eat dirt, and then teach him how to hang upside down. Trip ducked out from under the bleachers and chased after the smaller boy, laughing.

- o -

Vince paced around the roof of the building adjacent to Palm City General Hospital. He was worried about his wife, who'd been caught in the shooting at the Public Defender's Office. Almost as soon as he'd found out where Dana was, he'd headed straight for the hospital.

Dana was in the ICU, hooked up to too many monitors and a breathing tube. According to what chatter Orwell had been able to pick up, his wife was in a medically-induced coma to keep her from aggravating the wounds. One of the shots had come dangerously close to her spine, and another had nicked a ventricle.

The vigilante crouched down on the roof as someone entered the room his wife was in. He growled something under his breath when he saw that it was an ARK guard. More specifically, it was the one he'd dropped off a bridge so many months ago. What the hell was he doing…?

Vince's train of thought stopped as the man placed a bouquet on the bedside table next to another woman. Kia, wasn't it? She was one of his wife's friends from work. She'd been caught in the shooting too. She was in the ICU to make sure that her lung didn't collapse. Apparently Philips was here to visit her.

He sighed, rubbing his face with both hands. He really was getting too old for this, and he needed some more coffee. The vigilante stayed on the rooftop for another hour, just watching his wife breath with the help of a ventilator. Philips came back twice more, bearing more flowers for Dana, and a cup of coffee for himself.

The vigilante slunk away from the rooftop, guilt gnawing at his insides.

- o -

Philips sat in the ready room of ARK Towers' security team, gnawing on his lower lip as the security footage played on an endless loop. He'd been drafted into the team that was combing the building for a missing Dominic and whoever killed Doctor Samuel Ruben, largely due to his concussion. The security guard's leg jiggled nervously as he watched the familiar blond man scooping up an unconscious Nicky, and he wondered what was going through the man's mind.

Why kidnap Nicky, when there was so much else in ARK? (He knew for a fact that Peter Fleming had a fund set up, just in case he ever needed to pay his ransom—or, according to office rumor—pay his daughter's ransom if it turned out that she'd been abducted.)

He sighed, slouching in his chair as the footage looped again. A few seconds later, the man was upright in his chair and staring at the screen. Philips rewound the footage and stared at it, wondering what exactly had caught his attention. After five minutes, he found it. There was a three second jump in the footage before it rewound to the beginning.

The security guard groaned, realizing that he was now dealing with something that fell under the "Find that goddamn blogger!" heading. As insignificant as the three second jump was, it was going to go a long way to finding who'd abducted the bratling. Philips sighed, rubbing his temples. This called for more coffee and—he checked his watch—more medications. Hooray for vicodin.

He got up from his seat and stalked over to the sideboard where the ever-full coffeepot was kept. (It at least smelled drinkable this time.) Philips started when Sexton appeared almost out of nowhere next to him.

"Hello Philips," the older man said. Philips mumbled something into his mug of coffee that might have been a reply, but was probably just incoherent. After a few seconds, Sexton continued. "Heard you got caught in that business at the public defender's office yesterday."

Philips shrugged. "And?" he asked, popping a pill in his mouth. He chased it down with a swallow of coffee as he waited for a reply.

"Just wondering why you were down there on your off day," Sexton replied, leaning against the wall. "Figured you'd wait till your girl got off work before you headed over there." Philips swallowed uncomfortably at the tone in the man's voice.

Did Sexton suspect something, or was he just getting paranoid? When Sexton walked away, Philips let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. That had been _way_ too uncomfortable… Philips made a note to get his will written out after work. He had a feeling he'd need that too now.

Just wonderful. Philips hit his head against the wall-mounted cabinet and swore under his breath.

Just great.

- o -

Deveraux watched the two children run around the big top in a game of tag. There was a wistful smile on his lips as Trip tackled Dominic to the ground, making good on his promise to have the younger boy eat dirt. It had been quite some time since he'd watched children playing, without having to leave when the parents got suspicious.

"They aren't yours, you know."

The heavily-tattooed magician looked up at Max, eyebrows raised. He looked back at the boys, noting with a smile that Dominic had slipped out of Trip's headlock and was laughing as he demonstrated…something.

"I know," Deveraux replied after a few minutes. "I know." He sighed. "Something has been niggling at my mind, however. Something about the proxy… The spell worked, but…" The magician trailed off, rubbing his arms as if to ward off a chill. "Something didn't work correctly."

"And you're sure you did that one correctly?" Max asked, a note of skepticism in his voice. "I do remember the last time you tried that spell…" He laughed at the look on Deveraux's face, slapping the smaller man on the back. "Perhaps we should stick to the original champion next time, and avoid the proxies completely."

"Only if you promise never to use another demon," Deveraux muttered sullenly. His smile returned as Trip clumsily tried to copy Dominic's cartwheel. Dominic laughed and said something to Trip, before doing a back flip. Trip apparently hadn't liked what Dominic had said to him, because their game of tag resumed almost immediately.

"It was only the one time, and I thought you enjoyed the results," Max said, a mulish expression on his face. He flicked his fingers in an odd pattern, summoning another glass of red wine. "How many children did you give that mortal?"

Deveraux's answering grin was amused and somewhat lecherous.

"That's what I thought," Max murmured. He stood up from his place on the bleachers and left. Deveraux coughed and waved away the black smoke wondering, not for the first time, how his old friend had managed to get rid of the smell of rotten eggs.

Once again proving that he had the attention span of a gnat, Deveraux returned his attention to the two boys play fighting in the center of the big top's main ring. He grinned as Dominic grabbed Trip in a headlock, only to laugh and dance backwards a few seconds later. Who would have guessed that it would have taken another child to get him to act normally?

He sighed as the younger of the two flopped to the ground, laughing at something Trip had said. It was as if Dominic had never been in McClintock's hands… And that brought to mind the first time he'd met the child…

- o -

_Deveraux paced around the fair grounds, wondering why in Ishtar's name he'd even bothered to come. The magicians in these shows were useless at best and utter frauds at worst. He hadn't seen a real magician since Houdini had passed away, and that had been almost a hundred years ago. Really, trying to find a magician of any real talent these days was harder than finding a needle in a haystack. (He'd done that before too; his children had been remarkably good at finding the needle, never mind the fact that they'd set the haystack on fire first.)_

_The immortal was about ready to leave the fairgrounds in disgust and disappointment when a small sound met his ears. Although it had been nearly thirty years since he'd spent any length of time as a woman, the same maternal instinct reared its head in his chest. The man sighed and drew his coat around himself. As much as he hated to admit it, a child's cry of distress would never fail to summon him._

_He followed the sound of crying to a side tent located just off the circus's midway and stopped. The magician placed a hand over his mouth, reeling and trying not to vomit. The downside of being immortal, as he and Max had discovered in Poland a few decades before, was that strong emotions would leech into the surrounding area. It never failed to overwhelm either of them—it had been fun in the jazz clubs, but then they had made the mistake of traveling to Poland…_

_Deveraux shuddered and pushed the nausea back. He had no intentions of leaving a child in distress without at least looking into the situation. Comforted by that thought, the immortal pressed forward into the tent. What he found made him want to kill someone or throw up._

_A small child, he couldn't guess how old, was curled up in what looked like an animal pen. The boy's shoulders were shaking, and Deveraux guessed that he'd lost something—his eldest child had made those same little whimpers of distress after misplacing an ugly wooden horse Sir Gregory had made. _

_The magician sighed and strode across the ground to the pen, and lifted the child out with little ceremony. He took one look at the child's tear-stained face and felt murder in his heart. There was no reason for someone as young as this boy to have a look of fear and paranoia that strong in his eyes._

"_Oi! Wot th' fuck d'you think yer doin'?" A tall, well-built blonde man had stormed into the green tent. There was a murderous expression on his face, the magician surmised from his tone._

_Deveraux turned around, holding the boy against his side. A sick, frightening grin twisted his lips and face into a demonic mask. "Is this your son?"_

- o -

That meeting hadn't ended well, of course. McClintock had, according to what Deveraux remembered of the aftershocks of that meeting, gone stone-cold sober for several months. The boy, whose name (the child had informed him) was Dominic, had never spoken with him after that meeting. Dominic had been paranoid and terrified of everyone in equal measures at that age.

It was a pity he hadn't retained that paranoia, Deveraux thought glumly. It had made him so much more fun…

The magician jumped a little as his trace on the proxy returned. He stared at the tiny mote of blue-green light in surprise. After a few seconds, the man started laughing. It was a full, belly-rumbling laugh of pure mirth.

Somehow, against all odds, Jacob Philips had declared himself to be the young Dominic Raoul's proxy. While he would have preferred Peter Fleming, his dear nth-times great grandson to be the boy's proxy, he could only surmise one thing about this new development:

This was going to be hilarious.

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Want to know more about the previous contests? Drop a line and let me know!


	13. Arson, Murder and Jaywalking

Hey, it's a new chapter! The game is now in motion, and poor Philips gets tied up.

Beta'ed by the lovely WtchCool.

- o – o -

Chapter thirteen: Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking

Philips paced around his apartment, wondering why that uneasy feeling he always got after something went wrong had to manifest as an itch between his shoulder blades. It was impossible to scratch—he'd learned from experience—and it was driving him nuts. That itch also wasn't going to go away until he found out what had gone wrong. He was probably going to be facing an in-depth interrogation from his boss on why he'd been at the Public Defender's Office later. Thank God he'd gotten his will drafted earlier.

The security officer sighed and flopped down on his sofa. A few seconds later, he jumped up and began pacing again. The feeling of agitation was back, stronger than ever. Now, he wasn't so sure it had to do with an interrogation, and more with that ten-second jump in the video he'd watched six billion times yesterday. Maybe if he watched the copy he'd snuck out in his messenger bag again, he'd find what was bothering him…

Philips loaded the disc into his laptop and waited for the program to boot up. This was going to take time and a hell of a lot of coffee. He sighed, stretched, and took a look at the coffeepot, willing it to brew faster.

Fifteen minutes later, Philips was downing a pot of fresh coffee and advancing the video frame by frame to see if he'd missed something. There was no reason whatsoever for that jump in the video—hell; even Orwell's little spies hadn't gotten that good. He knew that little fact personally.

(The incident with that crazy chick, Dice or whatever her name was, had had the security teams going over every second of footage from the night that ARK Towers lost a good chunk of money and a brand new production line. Orwell's cut-and-paste video had been sloppy—nowhere near as good as this guy's work. Whoever he was, he was going to be a very big problem…)

Philips froze the video on a frame halfway through the jump and swore. He knew that face! He swore again, running through every curse in his rather substantial vocabulary. The security officer picked up his cell phone and dialed a number from memory.

"Hey Jacobs, it's Philips. Did we ever get an address off that Ilya guy, from a week or so back?"

He heard some rustling of papers on the other end of the line before Jacobs was back. The security officer jotted down the address and was out of his apartment minutes after hanging up. The itch between his shoulder blades was almost gone by the time he'd boarded the only bus headed for Trolley Park.

- o -

Vince sometimes wondered why the penalty for murder was so strong. In some cases, he'd have liked to believe he'd get away with it. (Like with strangling the little demon child named Dominic, for one. Who'd blame him for that?) In this case, though, he had half a mind to ask Deveraux to track down and/or resurrect McClintock just so he could torture the bastard to death. There was no excuse for the damage that bastard had done to the child under his care.

(No matter how much he wanted to strangle Nicky at some points, he had to acknowledge that killing McClintock would be easier to explain. Maybe. Hopefully.)

During the course of his career with the Palm City Police Department, he'd often wondered what made some criminals act the way they did. Some of them were already nuts to begin with, but some of them made him wonder… Unfortunately for his state of mind, Scales was beginning to dip into the latter category more and more often. That was the downside to being in contact with the little demon, apparently.

The vigilante sighed. Case in point: He'd stumbled out of bed yesterday morning, wondering if there was any way he'd be able to cook or make something resembling breakfast. To his surprise, he'd found Nicky already awake and cooking what smelled like real food. The thrill of sheer terror that had run up Vince's spine at the sight had nearly knocked him flat on his ass, truth be told.

How a ten-year-old had learned to cook that well was beyond the vigilante. It was terrifying. Hell, it was horrific! Wait… No, the cooking wasn't horrific. It was actually pretty good (that wasn't the point, but whatever.) What was horrific was the look of sheer terror on the kid's face as he scrambled for the nearest hiding spot.

It had taken him nearly twenty minutes to coax Nicky out of the back of the cabinet he'd somehow curled himself into. It had taken Trip five minutes to get his newest friend to stop shaking and go outside the trailer for another lesson in turning cartwheels.

Now, though, he was trying to explain _why_ Dominic wasn't allowed in the kitchen or near the stove without adult supervision. Trying to explain to Dominic that he wasn't going to be in trouble for not doing every single chore in the world was like talking to a circular brick wall. Although the brick wall would be more responsive, come to think of it…

Vince groaned at the mulish expression on the child's face. There was no getting through to him, not without blunt force anyways. (The sad thing was that he was beginning to consider it. The only thing stopping him was the fact that he didn't want to cause any more damage to the brat than what had already happened.)

He sighed and rubbed his face with both hands, wondering if it was too late to crawl back into bed. "Just… Look, next time you want to cook, come find me. I don't want you getting hurt. Alright?" Vince asked. He had hopes that this question would finally get through to the miniature. (With the adult, at least, he could have beaten Scales' head against the wall until the criminal saw the light.)

The kicked puppy-dog look he was getting from Dominic now wasn't helping. Vince decided that whoever had taught him to do that was going to die. That was a very _bad_ trick for someone like Dominic…

"Peak," the deformed ten-year-old replied. "Fine. I'll ask." He gave the former police officer an impish smile and scampered out of the trailer. Vince sighed and took a look out the window. Trip was chasing the other boy around the lot in another endless game of tag, and Dominic was laughing and saying something as Trip caught him.

Of course, after he'd finished murdering McClintock, he'd probably have to go after the brat as well for this headache…

- o -

Philips stared out the window, watching the scenery go by. Palm City's newest gang war had left some definite marks on the city. Some of them were fairly interesting, but most of them had led to an upsurge in the homeless population. At least five apartment buildings had been reduced to burned-out husks. ARK was getting roasted for its failure as a security corporation.

The security guard sighed and slouched down in his seat, keeping an eye on the flickering announcement board. He really didn't want to miss the stop at Trolley Park, because the stop after this one was in Dockland. (And ARK personnel who went in there alone tended to get shipped back to ARK Towers…in a few dozen pieces.)

He was upright a few seconds later, muttering whatever curse came to mind under his breath. The itch was back, and stronger than ever. What, had he missed something _else_? Good God, what the hell… His train of thought ground to a halt as the bus stopped in front of Trolley Park. Well, he'd figure it out later. Whoever Ilya was, he needed to chat with the man—and probably involve his gun, just in case.

(Philips had a horrible sinking feeling, accompanied by the thought that a little back-up would have gone a long way.)

There was a man at the bus stop. Philips only paid him mind because the man didn't even make a move to get on, nor did the driver ask if he wanted to get on. He froze as the man somehow appeared in front of him.

"Sleep."

He had a second to wonder what the man meant when he dropped like a sack of bricks.

- o -

Deveraux paced around the bus stop at the entrance of Trolley Park, muttering under his breath. The seeker spell Max had sent out over an hour ago should have borne results by this point. Unless, of course, his unwitting proxy had left the city in which case it could be another few hours to several weeks of waiting. The magician swore again and flopped down on the bench in the small plastic and metal shelters. He half wondered if the method for killing immortals was boredom.

Another bus rumbled up to the stop and Deveraux instinctively hid his presence from the driver. He had no desire for the driver to speak with him, not when the familiar buzz of a seeker was in the back of his mind, driving him to distraction. (Added to that, bus drivers seemed to be evil. Honestly, there were some things the Industrial Revolution had _not_ made better.)

A familiar man with a shaved head stepped off the bus, looking around rather anxiously. His hands were shoved into the deep pockets of his trousers and he looked as though he'd gotten dressed in a hurry. Judging by the bulge under his left arm, the mortal was carrying a gun. Not an unwise precaution these days, Deveraux thought.

It seemed his champion had arrived. He smiled and left the small shelter he'd been lounging in. Philips, the security guard, had a few seconds to look surprised before Deveraux utilized a spell he'd developed several centuries ago for children.

"Sleep." The man dropped like a sack of bricks at the immortal's feet.

Deveraux sighed, realizing he was going to have to drag the unconscious security officer to the big top. Ah well. That was what magic was for. Whistling, he hefted the larger man over one shoulder and strode towards the gaily colored tent.

He did have to admire the speed in which the young hypnotist Max had employed sped away. The boy was no doubt going to fetch his master. Good. That made this much easier in the long run.

- o -

Max was less than impressed with Deveraux on the best of days. Today was not one of them. The immortal wondered how long it would take to kill his fellow immortal or (barring that) how long a polymorph would stick to the shape-changer. He was staring at the current source of frustration, wondering if turning him into a frog would give Deveraux an aneurism.

Jacob Philips was sitting in his trailer, still unconscious. Deveraux had picked up a few skills sometime in the past fifty years, as the knots holding the security guard to the chair were quite ingenious. The immortal who'd knocked him out was lounging on the bed, looking like a well-fed and content cat.

"Well?" Deveraux asked, breaking the silence as he sat up and stretched like a cat. "Is the contest going to proceed as planned? My mortal against your pet magician?"

Max raised an eyebrow. "You realize that Philips won't win against Vincent. He's already been thoroughly trounced once."

Deveraux only smirked. Max felt a shiver run down his spine at the look. Before he could puzzle out what exactly it was about the look that had caused it, the door to his trailer opened. Three figures—two children and one mortal adult—trooped in.

Scales and Trip looked like they'd been wrestling in the dirt, and were both scratched up a bit. Vince didn't look happy about a number of things. The least of them was probably the state the two boys he was holding apart were in.

The two immortals looked at each other, eyebrows raised. They weren't quite sure they wanted to know, and had a feeling they would anyways. Max made a gesture towards Philips, and Deveraux got the message. Neither of them particularly wanted to find out why Faraday's charges were in such trouble.

Philips jerked awake with a muffled curse. He was quite unhappy to learn that, not only had he been knocked out, but also tied to a chair. The only one who wasn't grimacing at the effusive stream of curses was Dominic.

"Quiet, pet," Deveraux purred, dragging one long finger over Philips' lips. He turned to Max. "You can explain the rules. I have children to talk to." Max shot him a gimlet look, but Deveraux was already talking quietly to Trip and Scales. Both boys looked rather contrite; maybe it _was_ a good thing that Deveraux had raised eight children to adulthood…

Max sighed and returned his attention to Philips and Vince. Philips was testing his restraints, apparently trying to find any sort of give. Given the angry red hue his ears had turned, the security guard was having no luck. Vince seemed to be caught between laughter and fear—the fear was obviously over the fact that he wasn't wearing his mask, and that Philips would no doubt recognize him.

The immortal cleared his throat to gain both men's attention. "Jacob, Vincent," he said, voice frighteningly calm. "I trust you both have an inkling of what's going on?" At their looks of mutual distrust and confusion, Max had to guess they barely knew what was going on—only that it wasn't going to end well for one of them. Or both…

He sighed, rubbing his temples wearily. "The nature of immortality lends itself to interesting questions," the magician said as he began pacing, slipping into what an impertinent whelp had once called his lecture mode. "One of the questions that Deveraux and I have been trying to solve since we met several centuries ago—" he paused at a snort of disbelief from Philips and rolled his eyes.

"Since our meeting at that time, we have been trying to figure out which is stronger: Mortal or magic. So far, Deveraux seems to be winning the argument."

"Oh fuck."

Judging by the expletive both men had uttered, they knew where the conversation was heading. Vincent was proving magical (in his own way), and Philips was pure mortal. Really, it wasn't any wonder they had resorted to swearing.

Max smiled.

- o -

Deveraux was telling the two boys an amusing story about Sir Gregory and a Gypsy woman when Max finished his conversation with the delectable Vincent and bold Philips. He paused in his narrative, looking over his shoulder at his fellow immortal. There was something about the other man's smile he didn't quite like. He looked back at his young charges and sighed.

"I'll finish the story another time. Suffice it to say, Alma never did forgive Sir Gregory for her horse turning blue." Both boys snickered at that. Deveraux smiled as well—Alma had been fiery, a good match to his Gregory's calm nature. (If he hadn't been Rebecca at that point, he would have encouraged his fair knight to court the woman. As it stood, the friendship the mortals had developed had become something of a local legend.)

He walked over to Max, a feeling of apprehension in his gut. Max's champions had never exactly come out of these things well, no matter what charms or protections he gave them. The last one, well… He hadn't exactly come out of the situation sane. (Not that he'd been altogether there in the first place, but the point remained.)

Max spoke first, using a language no one in the trailer would even begin to understand. "The contest has begun. Are you sure you don't want to reverse the spell you put on Scales?" Deveraux raised an eyebrow at that, but Max continued. "Or, barring that, just put the brat into the competition. He's still mortal, and it would prove your point."

The air in the trailer froze. Literally. Max then remembered that threatening children, even peripherally, was not a good idea around his friend. He remembered this too late.

The ice storm was a bit of overkill, honestly.

- o - o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Looking for where the hell Sir Gregory came from? Drop a line and let me know!


	14. Unexpected Consequences

Well, it's a new chapter. Deveraux schemes, and Vince and Philips are getting their acts in gear.

Beta'ed by WtchCool.

- o – o -

Chapter Fourteen: Unexpected Consequences

Deveraux paced around the hotel room he'd appropriated for the duration of his stay in Palm City. To say the magician was in a foul mood was an understatement of astronomical proportions. The pictures and various knickknacks in the hotel suite rattled, a testament to the barely contained storm of emotions.

The immortal was angry at one specific person: Max Malini, the man who had not only stolen his name and his cloak two centuries ago, but who was also threatening his little ones. (Alright, so the children weren't actually his. The principle of the thing still remained, however. Vincent the younger and Dominic were, technically speaking, under his protection.)

He sighed and threw himself down on the chair, glowering at a portrait hanging on one wall. The impassive face stared back, doing nothing for the magician's mood. A few whispered words had the portrait turned into something much more pleasing—a picture of Peter Fleming, the double of his beloved Gregory.

Their last meeting—his meeting with Peter, not darling Gregory—had been…_fun_. The billionaire definitely wasn't as compassionate as Gregory, nor was he as bright (in terms of auras and _presence_; the man was quite intelligent, which was a relief), but he definitely had…something. Deveraux smiled and summoned a glass of red wine to his hand. He realized he was cribbing off of Max's tricks, but the wine was exquisite—it also hadn't been produced in almost eight-hundred years, but who cared?

The immortal leaned back in the cushions, studying the lightly-smirking portrait of Fleming. Deveraux dipped a finger in the glass of wine and murmured something under his breath. If he was going to move on the doppelganger at any point, he needed to force a confrontation somehow… The man's daughter, perhaps.

A lovely girl, Deveraux thought as he sent the spell to buzz in Orwell's mind. Almost the spitting image of Rebecca—of him.

This was going to be so much fun.

- o -

Orwell paced around her hideout, feeling a bit like a trapped animal. She would have gone to Vince's hideout, except for the fact that ARK troops had taken it over. If not for the fact that she'd caught their orders an hour beforehand, Vince would have been in ARK custody and his family would have been in danger.

She sighed, rubbing her temples. As the blogger passed a side table, she swiped the bottle of pills off it and began twisting the cap around. She didn't need to take one for another hour yet, but she needed something to do with her hands. Updating the blog for the fifth time today wasn't going to cut it at this rate.

The blogger sat down in front of her computer, massaging one temple as she opened her e-mail. It was… It was Jamie's. Not hers, not yet—not for a long time, anyways. Jamie never responded to daddy's e-mails, and Jamie didn't want Orwell to read her things.

Orwell gave herself a self-deprecating grin in the mirror hanging next to her bank of monitors—another few minutes, and she'd sound as crazy as daddy. She wasn't suffering from MPD just yet, but most days it _did_ feel like Jamie was another person entirely. Almost like another personality in her subconscious, who just wanted daddy back.

The blogger's train of thought ground to a halt as she opened a new e-mail. She didn't recognize the sender (there was, after all, a _very_ short list of people who knew Jamie's e-mail address). It was…curious. It wasn't Anarchy, thankfully. He was the only one who knew both sides of her personality; luckily, he thought ARK Corporation was too boring to bother with, and hadn't released any of his information to them.

As the hacker read the e-mail, her face went from pale to bone-white, and finally to red. Whoever the hell had sent this thing knew way, _way_ too much about her. Including the fact that she was related to Peter Fleming…knew that she was his daughter.

Orwell ran over every curse she knew as she sent out a query for the sender's address. She frowned as it turned up nothing, and sent it again. The pattern continued for five minutes—she'd even stooped to using the code Anarchy had sent her as a birthday present last year—and still turned up nothing, not even a fake IP. It was as if the message had appeared out of thin air in her in-box. _Like spam, but from hell_, Orwell thought with a smirk.

She groaned as she realized she'd have to figure out what the message meant if she wanted to find out who'd sent it. And when she did, she'd beat the sender with a computer for sending her a riddle disguised as a dirty limerick.

On the other hand… Orwell sat back in her chair. There was one person who could decipher it quickly. And she _really_ didn't want to contact him. If there was one person she hated more than Doctor Samuels and his wandering hands, it was Anarchy. He was the only hacker to outclass her in the international circuits…and he was _good_ at what he did.

The hacker opened the Switzerland-based e-mail account and began typing.

- o -

_You know_, Chess said, voice surprisingly amicable_, I almost preferred you lusting after Orwell._

Fleming hid a snort in his mug of coffee. Considering that the psychopath had threatened to gouge out their eyes if he ever caught a whiff of those thoughts again, that was saying something. He looked at the side-by-side images on his computer screen, a look of annoyance on his face. His security teams had, once again, come up with another possibility for Orwell's secret identity.

Ilya du Lyon stared back at him, a haughty look on his features. He could have been from the Mediterranean, or the Middle East or even Europe. As it stood, he was… Well, he was a mystery. The one thing Peter could remember quite clearly from their only meeting was a vaguely uncomfortable feeling in his gut—one that rather reminded him of his encounter with Tracey Jarrod after she'd grown up.

The man was mysterious enough to be Orwell, but was too…_flamboyant_.

_And we _aren't_?_ Chess asked, sounding incredulous. _Someone _please_ check this man's pulse. He's obviously a walking corpse._

"Shut up, Chess," Fleming murmured into his mug of coffee as he studied the profile on du Lyon. The young man was brilliant but hardly applied himself. Theoretical physics, fine arts, neuroscience, even chemical engineering… Quite obviously he had studied a number of diverse subjects in his—what, his twenty years or so?—but he'd never applied any of them to any decent use. And yet the only thing he had tried to do in the last five years was get close to a child-sized Dominic Raoul.

_And we both know the boy isn't related to Grayson, or the brat_, Chess muttered. _He _is_ delectable though. Why couldn't you coax him into bed, since you seem to be ignoring our nemesis?_

Fleming deigned not to dignify that with a response. He was well aware that Chess was a bit perverted, but did the psychopath have to be so blunt?

_Suit yourself_, Chess muttered, _but don't come crying to me when your head explodes from the build-up of tension…_

The billionaire sighed as his alter-ego disappeared to wherever he stayed when he wasn't needed. The bastard always had to have the last word, didn't he? Still, the psychopath did have a bit of a point—even if it _was_ an unwelcome one.

He was jerked out of his thoughts by the comm. signaling that he had a call. The billionaire absently accepted the call. A minute later, he was upright in his chair and demanding that his receptionist repeat the message.

His daughter was, inexplicably—oh thank God, she was here and who cared how it had come about?

"Send her in," Fleming ordered, standing up. What would his little ballerina look like, after all these years? Would she be as tall as her mother? Would she have his eyes still? He began pacing, clasping and unclasping his hands. It was like waiting in the hospital all over again, only this time Jamie wouldn't be a baby.

He looked up when his secretary escorted a young woman into his office. His daughter had hacked her hair off at some point, but it was _her_. Peter smiled.

"Hello Jamie."

- o -

Anyone who attempted to describe Jacob Philips as a patient man would have been laughed out of the room on the spot. The man tried to be patient around his girlfriend—and around Nicky, when he wasn't mad at the kid—but the truth was, he wanted immediate results. It was a horrible failing of his, he had to admit. (It was also a big part of why he'd dropped out of high school in the first place. He was just lucky his parents hadn't disowned him for entering the workforce instead of heading for college…)

The security guard muttered a few curses under his breath as he counted the doors of the storage lockers he passed. He'd gotten one here several months ago, after certain practices at ARK began to…unsettle him. (After the Cape had dropped him off the bridge, and after he'd gotten out of the hospital after that little stunt, he'd done a bit of thinking. He hadn't liked what he'd found.) On the other hand, if the people who ran the storage center ever searched his locker, they'd have had him arrested on the spot.

He pulled his key ring out of one of the pockets on his cargo shorts. It took a few seconds to find the right key—Kia had painted it sparkly pink for some reason—and pull the padlock off the door. And yeah—college wasn't the only thing his parents had disagreed with him on.

With himself being the sole exception, the Philips clan was very passive—passive-aggressive, in the case of his annoying as hell older brother. On his side of the coin, though… Well, he preferred direct action and using his fists to solve problems. He was intelligent enough to solve his problems in a cerebral manner, but he just didn't care to. (The one upside was that, after he'd crushed his older brother's nose with a chair, he'd never been forced into attending another family event. Kia hadn't spoken to him for a month, on the downside.)

Philips shoved the garage-style door up and out of his way so he could see the items he'd stored in his locker. He turned his flashlight on and aimed it around the locker, looking for one specific set of items. Yeah; if the owner of the storage center ever took a look in here, he'd call the bomb squad in a heartbeat.

The man smirked as he pulled the massive rifle off of the specially designed shelf. Buying the T-Rex rifle had cost him a decent chunk of change, but the cost was going to be worth it. He stuck a box of the nitro 360 cartridges into his messenger bag and ducked out of the locker. After securing the lock on the door again, Philips left without a backwards glance.

The Cape might have had a bulletproof cloak, but he was still mortal. And there was nothing that couldn't be stopped with a nitro express to the head.

Philips left the storage center with a malicious smile on his face. And there were some immortals who wouldn't survive it either…

- o -

Vince sat in the chair opposite his mentor, contemplating the glass of snake wine in his hand. When he'd stormed into Max's trailer half an hour ago, the immortal magician had taken one look at his face and said that he wouldn't talk until they both had a drink. Red wine was too weak for their conversation, but snake wine apparently wasn't. The magician had already gone through two glasses before he spoke.

"You're wondering why I chose you." It wasn't a question. Vince stared up at Max, and nodded anyways. Max sighed, rubbing one temple with his free hand. The vigilante felt his insides twist at the gesture. That meant this was going to be a really long conversation, or a really short one with an outcome he'd rather not see or hear.

"You had inherent magic. I've always favored magical power to a mortal's strength in this contest," Max said. "It was just luck that you happened to cross paths with myself and my employees that day."

Vince stared at his mentor. If he hadn't been chased through the train yards… Wait. Would that have meant that Max would have put one of the carnies into this insane contest? Jesus Christ almighty! He might not have liked some of them very much—Ruvi came to mind, for example—but he wouldn't have been cruel enough to chuck them into a contest against some nut job's champion. (That didn't mean he wanted to either, however.)

The vigilante sighed in disgust and drained the snake wine in one go. He made a face as it burned on the way down, and glowered at the now empty glass in his hand. Alcohol definitely wasn't going to help his mood at this point. Vince put the empty glass down on the crate in front of him and stood up.

"If you'll excuse me," he said in a not-quite snarl, "I have to go figure out how I'm going to get out of this competition alive." He left without another word.

Just as he was about to leave the lot where the carnies lived in their trailers, he ran into Philips. The man was toting one of the largest rifles Vince had ever seen—outside of some of the things Winny had toted around prior to his disappearance several years ago—and he had a serious expression on his face.

"Cape, we need to talk."

- o - o -

Well, what did you think? Good? Bad? Wondering what Philips is going to do? Drop a line and let me know!

As a side note, I've been informed I should explain some things. Trip is short for Triplet-in that Trip is "Vince Faraday the third". I doubt his parents would be cruel enough to name him Trip. And if you still haven't gotten the references to Rebecca, Sir Gregory or the demon yet, it's from a little known (for a _very_ good reason) movie James Frain starred in, called _Dark Relic_.


	15. Mad World

Hey, it's an update! RL decided to send me to a foreign country, so updating is going to be a bit screwey for a while.

Beta'ed by the amazing WtchCool.

- o – o -

Chapter Fifteen: Mad World

Deveraux paced around the receiving room in Peter Fleming's penthouse, mulling over the contest. The last time he'd had this much fun, Max had summoned a demon. (After that, they'd made a silent pact to never involve the Nether Realms in their contest again. Too many mortals dying tended to bring them unwanted attention.) Of course, it had also been nearly a thousand years ago (give or take a few decades; he was lousy with dates) and Sir Gregory had been around.

A wistful look wandered onto the immortal's face. Sir Gregory had won the contest by dint of the fact that he was simply too stubborn to die. The fact that he'd somehow been immune to the demon's influence had been beside the point. Now, he was going to be meeting his beloved knight's descendant—and praying to Ishtar or whatever deity was listening that the man had some compassionate streak. (Even a pale comparison to Gregory would have been welcome, if only for the fact that it'd been so long since he'd encountered a mortal with something like it.)

The immortal stopped pacing around the room and sat down. He almost smirked at the relieved sigh he heard from a security guard sitting at the other end of the room. People never seemed to like him pacing… It made them anxious. In a way, the reaction was saddening though; Sir Gregory had simply pulled him down to a seat and offered to kiss him—Rebecca—senseless if it'd get him to stop. (Honestly, the man was a god.)

"Mr. du Lyon?"

Deveraux looked up at the call. Oh yes. His current moniker was Ilya du Lyon, an incredibly brilliant but lazy youth from… Where _had_ his alias been from? Romania? Turkey? Egypt? Either way, it didn't matter. He stood up and straightened his coat, smirking as he walked past the secretary into the adjacent room. No matter what he did, the suit coat over a pair of tatty workman's trousers and a tie-dye shirt never failed to annoy people.

The magician froze at the sight of Fleming, framed against the massive windows in his office. _Sir Gregory, made flesh…_

The billionaire turned to face him, a business-like (slightly curious) smile on his face. "Ilya du Lyon, I presume?" The smile became more charming as he shook the immortal's hand. "A pleasure."

"The pleasure is mine," Deveraux murmured, wondering if mortal protocol towards flirting had changed any in the past fifty years. He smiled back, feeling his heart begin to beat like it hadn't in centuries.

This was going to be fun…

- o -

Philips paced around the trailer his vigilante host had appropriated a few days ago, tossing an orange up and down with one hand. He and Vince—the asshole vigilante who'd destroyed his truck and dropped him off a bridge—were trying to figure out how to get out of the contest they'd been hoodwinked into. Their planning hadn't produced any tangible results, other than irritation. Each idea was more ridiculous than the last.

"How about this," Philips said, leaning against one wall. "What if we just go into hiding for the next five years or something?" Vince stared at him, one eyebrow raised as if to ask if the stockier man was an idiot. "Right…"

The security guard ducked the grape Vince threw at his head and sighed, flopping down on the much-abused sofa. The springs in the faded floral cushions groaned in protest at the newest abuse. "Yeah. That wasn't going to work either." Philips sighed, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "What the hell are we supposed to do? The demonic little brats are pretty much the only reason we aren't cutting and running."

Both of them steadfastly refused to think about the fact that Vince's wife and Philips' girlfriend were in the hospital. That was another thing Deveraux was partially responsible for. His machinations had pretty much been the one spark the gangland powder keg needed.

"We've basically got nothing," Vince said, throwing his pad of paper down on the coffee table. "Trying to drown them in acid would be fun though," the vigilante mused, picking up another grape. He'd been planning on making something resembling lunch—and hopefully Trip and the demon would wander in—but that had been interrupted. His lunch preparations had turned into a free-for-all brainstorming session. All they needed was Hartman setting himself on fire out of boredom and it'd be indistinguishable from a Jackals' group meeting. Those had been fun…

"But where we'd get enough acid is the question," Philips returned as he began peeling his orange. He bit into the fruit and looked down at their list of suggestions. "Obviously feeding them to the tigers is out of the question, since they do seem to be immortal. Threatening not to compete has merit…" The security officer trailed off, a slice of orange halfway to his mouth.

Vince stared at the notation on the list, a slow grin forming on his face. "Philips, this could be the start of a beautiful friendship."

Philips' answering grin was just a bit feral.

- o -

Max stared at the two mortals sitting in front of him, wondering why he hadn't forced Deveraux to deal with them. Oh yes... That was right; the other immortal was reconnecting with his distant descendants. The idiot was probably trying to charm his way into Fleming's bed as well. The disturbing thing was that he'd probably succeed. Perhaps he could convince Julia to dig up some evidence that would get rid of Deveraux's current persona…

In the meantime, though, he had to deal with these two idiotic children.

"What, _exactly_," he asked in a calm voice, "are you implying?" He gestured at the sheet of paper on his desk in front of him. It had been neatly written—a clue that Vince hadn't been the primary force behind it. His apprentice's handwriting tended to deteriorate in proportion to how excited he was about something.

"It means we're not competing in your stupid contest," Philips replied, stretching lazily. The man had borrowed a shirt from Vince, and it didn't fit him too well. Whereas Vince was a gymnast, Philips had more in common with a boxer or a wrestler. In an out-and-out physical contest, Philips would no doubt have been the winner, simply by sheer force of strength. (Thankfully, Max thought, it wasn't quite as physical a competition as it had used to be. The resurgence of true talent in the world had leveled the playing field somewhat.)

Max sincerely wished he had a glass of wine, as he was far too sober to deal with this. Deveraux could have provided some serious help, but he was—of course—at ARK Towers. As the situation stood, it was too damn early to deal with this. He made a gesture and the legal paper disappeared, to be replaced by a glass of red wine.

The two mortals were unimpressed with his show of magic, which was disappointing. Max was about to speak when two heavy _somethings_ hit the side of his trailer. The magician sighed and walked over to the window. He looked out and contemplated turning the two children into frogs for the rest of the week.

Trip appeared to have tackled the younger Scales into the side of the trailer. Both of them were laughing and play-wrestling now, completely unconcerned about the damage they might have done.

Max had been right. It _was_ too early to deal with mortals while he was sober.

- o -

Dominic had never had this much fun in his life. Even when he'd been living with daddy, he hadn't had this much fun. (Daddy hadn't wanted to let the cops find him until the circus left town, taking that todger with it.) Play parks had been out of the question, as had children his own age. Now, though…

The ten-year-old dropped out of the bleachers, snarling like one of Raia's tigers. Trip Faraday, whom he'd tried to land on, screamed something that would have gotten him a good hiding from his father. He tried to grab the younger boy in a chokehold, face turning red in annoyance.

"Hold still, you little monster!"

The deformed boy grinned and slid out of the ineffective headlock, tumbling away from Trip. Even if his friend was the grandson of that berk, Officer Faraday, he was still tip-top. For a normal kid anyways… Dominic leapt backwards, laughing as Trip tried to put him into a headlock for the third time that morning. Unfortunately for him, his playmate was a tad too quick for that.

"Come back here, you little weasel!" Trip shouted, giving chase as the other ten-year-old sped away. Nicky was nuts, there was no other way to put it. Even if dad and the carnies he was staying with had some sort of vendetta against the other boy, Nicky was actually okay.

They were at least having more fun than when they'd run into Ruvi, Mr. Malini's hypnotist. Rollo was funny and Raia was sweet (and she was a really good cook), but Ruvi… Ruvi was terrifying.

- o -

_Trip crept around the trailer, keeping an eye out for Dominic. The other boy had a tendency to hang off the various poles around the big top, or off the struts on trailers. His proclivity for dropping out of nowhere, screeching like a howler monkey wasn't very endearing though. (There was also the fact that he hadn't been able to convince his dad that letting Nicky teach him how to do backflips was a good idea yet…)_

_The ten-year-old looked up, praying that Nicky wasn't hanging out of sight like some demented bat, and… His train of thought stalled as he heard some quiet sobs. Nicky had a very distinctive sound when he was crying—there was always a little whistling hitch in his breath right before he took another one. (Okay, so the nightmares weren't always a bad thing. His dad was happy that he could always find Dominic when the other boy disappeared.)_

_He knelt down to look under the trailer and caught a glimpse of Dominic's patched-up old shoes. They were mostly held together with duct tape and a prayer, which was weird. Why hadn't Officer Philips or Mr. Deveraux gotten him new shoes? Trip looked guiltily at his, which were pretty much brand new aside from some scuff marks on the toes._

_Trip straightened up, brushing the dirt off his knees. Wondering why his new friend was crying, he walked around the trailer and froze. His dad had done way too good __a __job at making sure he knew right from wrong…and _this_ was wrong._

_Dominic was cowering against the side of the trailer, and Ruvi was staring down at him. There was some unreadable expression on the hypnotist's face. It looked like Dominic had tried to scurry away several times, but hadn't succeeded. Trip clenched his hands into fists. Alright, he couldn't do much, but he could probably distract Ruvi long enough for Dominic to leave… Right?_

"_Hey, Mr. Ruvi!"_

- o -

It had turned out okay. Mr. Ruvi wasn't bothering Dominic anymore, and was avoiding both of them like the plague. He was also nursing a bandaged hand. Trip kinda regretted biting the hypnotist, but it had been worth it. Dad had yelled at Ruvi for half an hour for hitting him. No mention of Dominic had been made; judging by the look on Nicky's face, though, he hadn't minded too much. Which was weird, as usual.

"Gotcha!"

Trip yelled out in surprise as Nicky tackled him. He glowered at the other boy, who was giggling into his hands, blue-grey eyes dancing in amusement. Alright, he couldn't really blame the other boy for having fun. But still…

"This means war!" Trip yelled as he jumped upwards, running after Dominic. The deformed ten-year-old laughed madly, running towards the other end of the big top. Trip drew close and leapt at him. They slammed into the side of Mr. Malini's trailer.

A few seconds later, Trip looked up, a goofy grin on his face. "We're in trouble, aren't we?" he asked. Malini sighed and drew his head back into the trailer. Trip looked at Dominic, who was laying in the dirt next to him. Despite the ringing in their ears and the pain from ramming headfirst into the trailer, they both burst out laughing.

- o -

Max sighed as he looked at the two mortals still seated in his trailer. Philips raised an eyebrow, as if to ask if something was wrong. Aside from their lack of cooperation (unwitting or not) and the fact that their brats might have killed themselves, nothing was wrong. Max wondered how long his supply of wine was going to last at this rate. He summoned another glass and shrugged mentally. Deveraux _had_ given him the address of a rather excellent winery that was willing to supply red wine by the barrelful without too many questions.

"I assume you'll be going through with this?" he asked, gesturing to the paper he'd resummoned to his desk. The two men nodded, and Max drained the rest of the glass.

"Deveraux," he said, speaking into the mirror on his desk, "We need to talk." The mirror glowed blue for a few seconds, before Deveraux's face appeared in it.

-_I'm rather busy at the moment_- the other immortal said waspishly. Some faint laughter came through the shaky connection. Deveraux was probably busy charming his way into Fleming's good graces. That was practically a skill unto itself.

"Our mortals have refused to compete."

-_Have they really?_-

The interest in Deveraux's voice was a bad thing, Max decided as the connection cut off abruptly. And this conversation was going to end very, very badly…

- o - o -

Well, what did you think? Good? Bad? Want to know if Max and/or Deveraux will be turning Philips and Vince into frogs? Drop a line and let me know!


	16. Try Us, We're Gullible

Well, here it is. The last chapter of Time Again. (Don't worry, there's an epilogue slated for next week.)

Beta'ed by the amazing WtchCool.

- o – o -

Chapter Sixteen: Try us, we're gullible

When Deveraux arrived back at Trolley Park, it was late in the afternoon and the sun was beginning to set over the horizon. Judging by the grin on his face and the fact that he was wearing a dress shirt that was far too large on his thin frame, his day had gone exactly as planned. Max honestly couldn't say he was surprised at the state of his companion.

Hell, he was just surprised that the younger immortal had arrived in such a timely manner. Given that he had apparently charmed his way into Fleming's bed, Max wouldn't have expected either of them to be appearing in public again. Not for at least a week, at any rate. (At least Deveraux was no longer sighing over his dearly departed Sir Gregory, for which Max was especially grateful. That had begun to get grating.)

The younger immortal had arrived back at the scene of a madhouse, however. Rollo was trying to explain something to the miniature Scales, who had a shell-shocked look on his face. Raia was chastising Ruvi for something while she put a bandage on Trip's hand. Ruvi was swearing in Romanian and drinking a mug of what was most likely homemade alcohol.

Max was sitting on the sidelines, keeping an eye on a tank containing two frogs.

Deveraux stared at the scene before him, before his gaze fell on the frog tank. His grin faded somewhat. Had Max turned their rebellious champions (well, champion and proxy) into frogs? There was a reason he never polymorphed anyone who wasn't powerful, magically speaking. Ishtar only knew what damage his drunken companion had inflicted on them. Mortal psyches were far too fragile for animal shape shifting; not without proper preparation, of course.

"Deveraux," Max drawled, drawing the younger immortal's attention away from the frogs. The shape-shifter looked up from his quiet study, eyebrows raised. And he'd been so close to figuring out if the large brown one was Vince…

"Yes?" the younger immortal replied absently, returning his attention to the frog tank. He crouched down and rested his chin on his clasped hands.

"I trust you remember receiving my message?" Max asked. It might as well have been rhetorical, as Deveraux never forgot anything. Whether he was aware that he'd actually received a message was the question though. Had it not been for his…activities, Max was sure that learning of both champions' refusal to compete would have been at the forefront of Deveraux's mind.

"Yes…" Deveraux replied absently, ignoring his friend's question. The large brown frog croaked before going back to sleep. Nah, that one was probably Philips. Vince was most likely the red-eyed tree frog. Hm…. "Are those frogs Vince and Philips?"

"Beg pardon?" Max sounded genuinely surprised at the question. Considering the dynamics of dealing with Deveraux—who was worse than a five-year-old high on sugar on the best of days—it wasn't that unusual a reaction.

"The frogs. Are they Philips and Vince? Because I think the little green one is Vince." Deveraux stared at him, the childish gleam in his eyes being replaced by what Max had long ago termed the "teacher" look. "And need I remind you that transfiguring mortals capable of sentient thought is a very bad idea? Do you remember what happened to Gregor?"

Max winced. A few seconds later he was laughing, however, as the question and accusation finally registered. After a few minutes, the laughter subsided and the magician shook his head, wiping his eyes with the back of one hand. "No, no, they're not. The demon and Trip found them underneath Raia's trailer earlier today. Raia put them in here."

"Fooey," Deveraux muttered sullenly under his breath. "So, about this contest that no longer seems to be happening…"

"The idiot you selected as proxy managed to put a hold on it."

The younger immortal only grinned at Max's tone. "So I heard," he replied dryly, conjuring a seat for himself. "But I was _hardly_ the one who picked Philips. He did that all by himself, the little idiot…"

"And I sometimes wonder how you managed to survive…" Max muttered under his breath. He rubbed his temples wearily and summoned a bottle of wine and two glasses. "Care to plan how this will get back in motion?"

"No. Max, I overheard something interesting while taking a shower in Peter's home…"

If Max were far less unflappable than he was, he would have paled considerably as Deveraux outlined what he'd heard.

"Well fuck." That was the only way to sum it up, really.

- o - o -

Peter Fleming sat in his office later that evening, contemplating the mystery of Ilya du Lyon. There was no denying that the younger man was excellent in bed—hell, even Chess hadn't had anything to complain about, aside from wondering if it would be possible to drag the Cape in for another round. But then there was the fact that he'd appeared almost out of nowhere. There was no denying he had an excellent grasp of the subjects he claimed to hold degrees in, but that none of the professors listed in his resume could even remember him.

_Stop complaining_, Chess grumbled in the back of his mind. _You're just sore he left without another word. And didn't bother to leave a number…_

If du Lyon had made an impression that great on Chess, then that was _definitely_ something worth investigating again. Unfortunately, Fleming had no time to pursue such an interesting route of study. The bloody Department of Defense was breathing down his neck, and demanding that he produce Scales.

Sadly, he had neither the child nor the answers the DoD's representative wanted. It was frustrating. What was even more frustrating was that he'd somehow missed the fact that the idiotic smuggler had a contract with the Department of Defense that made _his_ look positively...inconsequential. It was infuriating.

_Scales does manage that quite well, no matter his age, doesn't he?_

"I don't need your input," Fleming murmured quietly as he stood up. There was fresh coffee, and it was easier to hide his responses to Chess behind a mug than simply avoiding moving his lips.

_Am I _wrong_?_ Chess asked. The maniac had a point. _I knew you'd see that eventually._

Fleming sighed and rubbed his temples. It was getting to the point—_again_—where he wished he hadn't killed Samuels. Whatever the man had done, it'd gotten Chess to shut up for almost three months. His homicidal alter-ego had actually been stunned into silence for nearly twenty minutes after he slit his doctor's throat with a straight razor. (Ah, blessed silence in his own head. What a rarity.)

_And I thought _I_ was the snarky one_.

"Shut up, Chess," Fleming murmured under his breath. At the moment, he didn't need any input from his homicidal alter-ego. Not with the two representatives from the Department of Defense prowling towards his desk, anyways. That would have been…unfortunate, and hiding two bodies during an investigation of his company was more hassle than strictly necessary.

The taller, darker man sat down without an invitation and studied the billionaire like he would an insect. If Fleming hadn't had to deal with Chess on a daily basis, it would have worried him. He chose to ignore the man sitting across from him and studied his partner. The man had an annoying similarity to Vince Faraday and the Cape—the way he held himself, how he seemed to prowl around the room…

And that was entirely too much coincidence for Fleming's mind. If not for the fact that Vince Faraday was irretrievably dead, he'd have guessed that the Cape _was_ the disgraced former police sergeant. As it was…

"You know, I always wanted to know what kind of guy would manipulate Faraday."

Judging by the expression on the darker man's face, this statement always seemed to be a prelude to violence. Fleming felt his utmost sympathy go out to the man at that. As to this man's relation to Faraday…

"But that isn't why Major Darwin and I are here. We're here because your company screwed up big time, in more than one area." The man smiled, showing off some rather sharp canines. "I'm Jake Lofgren. And trust me, you will soon regret ever learning my name."

Fleming rather doubted that.

- o – o -

Philips paced around the hospital waiting room, gnawing on his lower lip. As far as the doctors and staff were concerned, he wasn't here. Considering how long he'd been playing hooky from work, that was probably a good thing. He knew he should have stayed away after pulling his vanishing act, but Kia and Mrs. Faraday were more important than that.

The security officer sighed and slid down the wall. He was currently waiting for one of the doctors in the ICU to tell him he could visit Kia for a few minutes, or for one of them to tell him to buzz off. Either way, he just wanted some confirmation that his girlfriend was still breathing. Philips groaned and beat the back of his head against the wall. Somehow, this whole situation was either his fault or ARK's. And the fallout wasn't going to be pretty…

He froze as he heard voices coming down the hallway towards the ward. They were discussing something about Mrs. Faraday, and they weren't exactly making any attempts to lower their voices. The security officer reached under his baggy sweatshirt, hand closing around the cool metal of his service pistol. Shooting people in a hospital wasn't a good idea, but at least help would arrive quickly, and…

"Who the hell are you?"

Philips stared at the two men who'd entered the ward. Both of them were wearing military uniforms, and judging by the looks on their faces, they were not having a good day. He had just made it worse, which was not a comforting thought.

"I'm Jacob Philips," Philips volunteered, standing up.

"Are you really?" the shorter man murmured, a look of interest on his face. "This is Major Darwin, Department of Defense. I'm Jake Lofgren, no rank. Special investigator. Tell me, would you happen to know where Dominic Raoul is?"

_Oh this was going to be interesting_, Philips thought as Lofgren studied him. He sat down and gestured to the other uncomfortable chairs in the waiting room. "This is going to be a bit of a long story, gentlemen," he said. Philips had the feeling that, along with his getting fired, this was going to be one of the most interesting conversations of the past month.

As he outlined the very basic parts of the story, ignoring where he'd been for the past week and the true identity of the asshole vigilante, the men's faces grew more and more intent. Despite the uneasy itch between his shoulder blades, Philips had the feeling that they were exactly what they appeared to be.

Fleming was going to regret ever hearing of Dominic "Scales" Raoul after this conversation. Philips was pretty sure that would be the man's reaction after this. That, or both of them would end up in prison—Fleming for god knows how many crimes, and himself for aiding and abetting said crimes.

Either way, it was going to be one hell of a ride.

- o – o -

When Philips arrived back at Trolley Park, it was well into the evening. A quick peek into the trailer showed that Trip and the miniature Scales were curled up on the sofa, sleeping. If he'd had a camera, he would have taken several photos for blackmail purposes. (Hey, if praise worked, so would blackmail of this order. Who knew? Faraday might have been interested in the photos too.)

The man ducked out of the trailer after making sure the brats were both sound asleep and located Vince as quickly as possible. The conversation he'd had with the two men from the Department of Defense had been _far_ too interesting and…enlightening.

"Faraday," he said quietly, sitting down next to the vigilante, "we need to talk."

Vince looked over, eyebrows raised. He'd been listening to some story that Malini was telling (one that had Deveraux scowling at him, blushing red all the while). "What's the problem?" the former police officer replied, just as quietly.

"The Department of Defense is nosing around," Philips murmured, picking up a rock. He turned it over in his hands as he described the conversation. The snort of laughter from Faraday wasn't exactly what he'd expected.

"Oh this is gonna be good," Faraday crowed under his breath. "If they dragged Lofgren out of the mothballs, then Fleming is screwed."

And really, Philips could believe that.

- o – o -

So, what did you think? Good? bad? Wondering what Lofgren is going to get up to? Leave a review and let me know!


	17. Epilogue

Well, this is it. Time Again comes to a close, after seventeen chapters and over 50,000 words.

Many thanks to WtchCool for her services as beta, as well as fixing all of the errors in story flow that popped up. Thanks also go out to Orwell for her lovely reviews and encouragement that helped get this story through the rough patches. And, of course, Belladonna4 for sticking with the story and bumping the review count. You guys were fantastic.

- o – o -

Epilogue

Surprisingly enough, Fleming did come to regret learning Jake Lofgren's name, although not in the way Lofgren would have imagined. When the military had dragged the Jackals out of the mothballs, they had been hoping for a quick resolution to two problems: The mysterious death of Vincent Faraday II, and the equally mysterious circumstances surrounding a child who had been—at one point, nearly six months ago—their largest supplier of weaponry.

Lofgren's investigation turned up several interesting leads regarding the death of Captain Faraday. The most interesting fact was that Fleming had received the tip on his private line, and not via the ARK switchboard, as had been previously thought. It was no surprise, really, when a search of the train yards turned up some old service tunnels…and a disturbing lack of human remains.

If anyone had been privy to Chess' comments in the back of Peter Fleming's mind, they would have had quite a laugh. Fleming was seen downing acetaminophen like it was candy for almost a week after the lack of remains was discovered. The investigation into his company's role in the death of a decorated veteran was playing hell on the stock prices.

Two weeks after Lofgren and Major Darwin had appeared in Palm City, another surprising turn of events came in the form of Jacob Philips bringing his young charge to the hotel the two investigators were staying in. The other people in the hotel heard Major Darwin yelling at the ARK security officer for several minutes. The housekeeping staff quietly ignored the bullet holes in the door and added a charge to the bill.

The Department of Defense, not convinced of the child's identity, ran their own series of DNA tests. At the end of the battery of tests, they had genetic proof of Scales' identity. It was quietly agreed that putting his _legal_ operations in trust was the best decision. Michael Kaczanowiczk was given control of the docks.

Several weeks after the docks were turned over to the new head of the union, a more sensational piece of news hit the city. Peter Fleming's daughter reappeared in the land of the living. Surprisingly, Fleming did not order a DNA test to be sure. The girl's resemblance to her mother was enough proof for him.

Despite all attempts to the contrary, the press was never able to turn up more than the bare minimum on Jamie Fleming. They were able to turn up even less on Ilya du Lyon, Peter Fleming's new lover. (No one knew where du Lyon had come from, or even when Fleming had expressed an interest in men. They were even more surprised when Fleming and du Lyon moved into a manor on the coast of England.)

Even before the furor over the Flemings died down, the press's attention was drawn to something entirely new: Vince Faraday was back from the dead. He had been hiding out at an undisclosed location for a little over a year. Surprisingly, his wife didn't murder him at the press conference he attended to announce the fact that he was alive. (Given that she was still on bed rest, it made a little more sense.)

News on the Faradays was sorely lacking. Truth be told, the only one who seemed disappointed at the fact that Vince was still alive was Travis Hall.

Over the next year, things changed very little in Palm City, despite the havoc caused by Vince Faraday's return to life, the mysterious de-aging of Dominic "Scales" Raoul, and the reappearance of Jamie Fleming.

By the end of the two-year mark, Jamie Fleming had taken over her father's company. The elder Fleming had retired quietly, some said due to his health (the death of his psychiatrist, some said, must have left a mark on him). Others said it was due to the increased frequency of various assassination attempts, although no one ever discovered who was behind those.

Jamie Fleming's rule of ARK was far more benign than her father's had been. She was more willing to work with the city government, for one thing. The number of military contracts that ARK received, contrary to public opinion, actually skyrocketed under her tenure as the head of the company.

Jacob Philips eventually took up the role as her chief of police. According to those privy to the knowledge, he wasn't her first choice. Given that Dana Faraday was a bit tetchy about her husband being near anything related to ARK, it was understandable that he didn't take the job. It was no surprise, then, that the Faradays entered couples counseling when Vince took up the mantle of Jamie Fleming's head of security.

If anyone had asked, however, Jamie needn't have bothered hiring Vince in the first place. Her boyfriend—and later husband—was quite effective at dealing with anyone who would have bothered his girl in the first place. The pipe wrench was more effective, the press decided, than a fleet of security officers. The good opinion they had of Rollo disappeared when the majority of Palm City's press and paparazzi wouldn't be allowed to attend the quiet wedding.

No one questioned the lack of information from Orwell Is Watching as time went on. It seemed that the blogger had given up trying to dig up dirt on ARK after Peter Fleming had retired to a private residence somewhere in England. There were few tears shed among Palm City's politicians when the site disappeared for good—although the appearance of a hacker named Anarchy, from time to time, made them wish for the days of Orwell.

The Cape never really disappeared from Palm City. According to his most loyal followers, there was simply too much for the vigilante to do. Even the lack of violence on the docks seemed not to deter the man.

Twenty years later, the original Cape finally did retire. Getting rescued by the man his former enemy had grown into, one observer noted, was probably the final nail in the old vigilante's coffin. Of course, Dominic Philips wasn't the type to gloat. He accepted the praise with due grace, and promptly returned his attention to chasing a soccer ball around.

If anyone suspected that either Scales or the Faradays knew who had taken up the mantle of the Cape next, they weren't telling anyone.

After all, the Cape was _their _vigilante.

- o - o -

So, what did you think of the story? Good? Bad? Did everyone get what they deserved? Drop a line and let me know.


End file.
